L I' 





Book ^ "^^ 







TOBlitrCO: 



T6 



It 6^ 



ITS 



HISTORY, VARIETIES, CULTURE, 



MANUFACTURE AND COMMERCE, 



AN ACCOUNT OF ITS VARIOUS MODES OF USE, FROM ITS FIRST 
DISCOVERY UNTIL NOW. 



/ BY 

E. R. BILLINGS. 



WITH ILLtrSTKATIONS BY POPULAR ARTISTS. 



'^Cm OF CO.vii^, 




' My Lord, this sacred herbe which never offendlt. 
Is forced to crave your favor to defend it." 

Barclay. 

'But oh, what wltchcrfift of a stronger kind. 
Or cause too deep for hnman search to find. 
Makes earth-born weeds Imperial man enslave,— 
Not little souls, but e'eu the wise and brave ! " 

Arbtjckle. 



HARTFORD, CONN.: 

AMERICAN PUBLISHING COMPANY, 

1875. 



Entered according to act of Congress, in the year 1875, by the 

AMERICAN PUBLISHING CO., 
In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington, D. C. 



'^ 



TO 

CHy\RI.E3 DUDI.EY WAF^NEF^, 

TVhose rare, good gifts have endeared "him to all 
lovers of the English tongue, this volume, histori- 
cally and j>raotically treating of one of the greatest 
of plants, as well as the rarest of luxuries, is re- 
spectfully dedicated ty 

The Author. 



PEEFACE. 

Ever since the discovery of tobacco it has been the favorite 
theme of many writers, who have endeavored to shed new light 
on the origin and early history of this singular plant. Upwards 
of three hundred volumes have been written, embracing works in 
nearly all of the languages of Europe, concerning the herb and the 
various methods of using it. Most writers have confined them- 
selves to the commercial history of the plant ; while others have 
written upon its medicinal properties and the various modes of 
preparing it for use. For this volume the Author only claims 
that it is at least a more comprehensive treatise on the varieties 
and cultivation of the plant than any work now extant. A full 
account of its cultivation is given, not only in America, but also 
in nearly all of the great tobacco-j)roducing countries of the 
world. The history of the plant has been carefully and faithfully 
compiled from the earliest authorities, that portion which relates 
to its early culture in Virginia being drawn from hitherto unpub- 
lished sources. Materials for such a work have not been found 
lacking. European authors abound with allusions to tobacco ; 
more especially is it true of English writers, who have celebrated 
its virtues in poetry and song. All along the highwaj^s and by- 
paths of our literature we encounter much that pertains to this 
" queen of plants." Considered in what light it may, tobacco 
must be regarded as the most astonishing of the productions of 
nature, since it has, in the short period of nearly four centuries, 



riii PREFACE. 

dominated not one particular nation, but the whole world, both 
Christian and Pagan. Ushered into the Old World from the 
New by the great colonizers — Spain, England, and France — it 
attracted at once the attention of the authors of the period as a 
fit subject for their marvel-loving pens. It has been the aim of 
the writer to give as much as possible of the existing material 
to be had concerning the early persecution waged against it, 
whether by Church or State. These accounts, while they invest 
with additional interest its early use and introduction, serve as 
well to show its triumph over all its foes and its vast importance 
to the commerce of the world. This work has been prepared 
and arranged, not only for the instruction and entertainment of 
the users of tobacco, but for the benefit of the cultivators and 
manufacturers as well. As such it is now presented to the public 
for whatever meed of praise or censure it is found to deserve. 
Hartford, Conn., 1875. 



ILLUSTRATIONS. 



PAGK 

1. Fkontispiboe , — 

2. Tobacco Stalks 22 

3. Tobacco Lbates 24 

4. Bttd and Flo we rs 25 

5. Capsitles. (Fruit Bud.) 27 

6. Suckers 28 

1. Primitivb Pipe 83 

8. Native Smoking 35 

9. Old Engraving 40 

10. The Contrast 44 

11. John Koltk 48 

12. Virginia Tobacco Field, 1620 51 

13. Buying Wives 57 

14. Growing Tobacco in the Streets 64 

15. Natives Growing Tobacco 66 

16. Destroying Suckers 69 

n. Carrying Tobacco to Market 73 

18. Enriching Plant-Bed 75 

19. Shipping Tobacco 78 

20. ObD Engraving op Tobacco 86 

81. Sir Walter Raleigh 89 

22. English Gallants 90 

23. Smoking in the ITth Century 94 

24. Exhaling through the Nose 97 

23. Old London Ale-house 101 

26. Punishment fob Snuff Taking 104 

27. Silver Spittoons 106 

28. The Negro Image 108 

29. Tobacco and Theology 112 

80. Weighing Smoke 117 

31. Indian Pipe 126 

82. Sculptured Pipe 128 

38. Pipe of Peace 130 

34. A Model Cigab 132 

35. South Americans smoking 135 

36. A War Pipe ! 139 

37. Peace Pipe 140 



X ILLUSTRATIONS. 

PAGE 

38. A TcHUKTCHi Pipe 148 

39. Turk Smoking 145 

40. Old English Pipes 148 

41. Fkknch Pipes 149 

42. Pipe Colorer 153 

43. Gebman Porcelain Pipes 153 

44. A Persian Water Pipe 156 

45. Seakcuing for Amber 160 

46. Fancy Pipes 162 

47. Clay and Rked Pipes 164 

48. Fairy Pipes 166 

49. Female Smoking in Algiers 168 

50. African Pipe 170 

51. Egyptian Pipes , 178 

52. Japanese Pipes 173 

53. Engraved Boxes 177 

54. Tobacco Jars 179 

55. Tobacco Stoppers 181 

56. Lord and Lackey 185 

57. ThhStrange Youth 190 

58. 6M0KER9 BEADI>G EPIGRAMS 193 

59. The Explosion 195 

60. Theory against Experience 199 

61. A Faithful Attendant 203 

62. Newton and his Pipe 207 

63. Tennyson. Smoking 209 

64. Modern Smokers 212 

65. The Artist 215 

66. The Yankee Smoker 216 

67. A Tobacco Grater 220 

68. Dkmi-journbes 222 

69. James Gillespie 224 

70. Fops Taking Snuff. (From an old print.) 226 

71. Horn Snuff-boxes 227 

72. Scotch Snuff-mills 232 

73. Sweeping from the Pulpit 235 

74. Snuff-mill, a Century ago 240 

75. Perfuming Snuff 242 

76. Fuegian Snuff-Takers 244 

77. Snuff-Dipping 247 

78. Snuffe RS 248 

79. Fancy Snuff-boxes 251 

80. Curing a Headache 255 

81. Highlanders 257 

82. Cigars 260 

83. Cigar-holders 262 

84. Life in Mexico 266 

85. Cuban Cigar Shop 268 

86. Tobacco Leaf 271 

87. Wenches Smoking 274 

88. A Moonlight Kevekik in Havana 275 

89. By the Sea 277 

90. An American Smoker 279 

91. "Light, Sir?" • 282 

92. Bringing a Light 285 

93. Making Cigars 288 

94. Havasas 301 

95. Yara Cigars 303 

96. Manilla Cigar and Cheroot 304 

97. Swiss Cigars 306 

98. Paraguay Cigars 306 

99. Connecticut Tobacco Field 312 



ILLUSTRATIONS. XI 

PAGE. 

100. HOMK OF THE CONNEOTIOTJT PLANTBE S15 

101. Negro Quaktees 317 

102. The Planter's Home 318 

103. "Bdkning the Fatcu." 322 

104. Stringing the Pkimings 323 

103. Worming 325 

106. Ohio Tobacco Field 329 

107. Tobacco Warehouse 331 

108. Kentucky Tobacco Plantation 332 

109. The KENTUCKr Planter 334 

110. Florida Tobacco Plantation 336 

111. Louisiana Tobacco Plantation 338 

112. Mexican Tobacco Plantation 342 

113. St. Domingo Tobacco Field, 1535 345 

114. A Cuban vega 346 

115. Killing Bugs by Night 348 

116. Going to Market 349 

117. German Tobacco Field 351 

118. Dutch Planters 355 

119. Success to Von Tkomp 358 

120. Tobacco Field in Algiers 360 

121. Tobacco Field in Africa 361 

122. Tobacco Field in Syria 363 

123. Tobacco Field in India 365 

124. Turkish Tobacco going to Market 370 

125. Japan Tobacco Field 371 

126. Transplanting 372 

127. Chinese Tobacco Field 373 

128. Tobacco Field in Persia 374 

129. Growing Tobacco on the Philippine Islands 377 

130. Tobacco Plow 378 

131. Spanish Planters 380 

132. Mexican Dwarf Tobacco 384 

133. Connecticut Seed Leaf 385 

134. Havana Tobacco 387 

135. Virginia Tobacco 388 

136. Ohio White Tobacco 389 

137. Latakia Tobacco (Syria), • 393 

138. Orinoco Tobacco (Venezuela), 397 

139. Shieaz Tobacco (Persia) 398 

140. Spanish Tobacco 400 

141. Japan Tobacco , '■■ 402 

142. Old Connecticut Tobacco Shed 466 

143. Modern Connecticut Tobacco Shed 407 

144. Stripping Room 408 

145. Modern Virginia Shed 409 

146. Virginia Shed, 150 years ago 410 

147. Ohio Tobacco Shed 412 

148. PEP.SIAN Tobacco Shed 414- 

149. Making the Plant Bed in Connecticut 418 

150. Covering Plant Bed 424 

151. A Tobacco Eidger 430 

152. Drawing the Dirt Around the Foot 432 

153. Transplanting 433 

154. Transplanting 434 

155. American Transplanter 437 

156. The Worms 438 

157. Worming Tobacco 439 

158. Topping 442 

159. SUCKERING 445 

160. Cutting the Plants 446 

161. Putting on Lath , 447 



Xll ILLUSTEATIONS. 

TAGS 

162. Cakkting to thk Shed 448 

163. STRrppiNG 456 

164. Hands 457 

165. Stemming 460 

166. Packing 461 

167. Prizing in Olden Times 464 

168. Tobacco Press 467 

169. Firing 470 

170. Spanish Seed Tobacco 473 




CHAPTER I. 

THE TOBACCO PLANT. 

PAGE 

Botanical Description — Ancient Plant-Bed — Description of the Leaves — 
Color of Leaves — Blossoms — The Capsules and Seed — Selection for 
Seed — Suckers — Nicotine Qualities — Medicinal Properties — Im- 
provement in Plants 17 

CHAPTER II. 

TOBACCO. ITS DISCOVERI:. 

Early Use — Origin of its Name — Early SnufF-Taking — Tobacco in Mex- 
ico — Comparative Qualities of Tobacco — Origin of the Plant — 
Early Mammoth Cigars— Sacredness of the Pipe — Early Culti- 
vation — Proportions of the Tobacco Trade — Variety of Ivinds — 
Tobacco and Commerce — Original Culture 32 

CHAPTER III. 

TOBACCO IN»'aMERICA. 

First General Planter — State of the Colony — Conditions of Raising 
Tobacco — Tobacco Fields, 1620 — Increase of Tobacco-Growing — 
Restriction of Tobacco-Growing — Tobacco used as Money — King 
James opposes Tobacco-Growing — Buying Wives with Tobacco — 
Foreign Tobacco Prohibited — King Charles on Tobacco — King 
Charles as a Tobacco Merchant — Tobacco Taxed — Planting in 
Maryland — Negro Labor — Competition — Growing Suckers — Virgin- 
ia Lands — Picture of Early Planters— Large Plantations — Getting 
to Market — Virginia Plant-Bed — Maryland Plant-Bed — Tobacco 
Growing in New York and Louisiana — New England Tobacco — 
Commercial Value of Tobacco — Tobacco a Blessing 47 

CHAPTER IV. 

TOBACCO IN EUROPE. 



Introduction — The Original Importer — "Wonderful Cures — How the Herb 
grew in Reputation — Difference of Opinion — A Smoker's Rhapsody 



XIV CONTENTS. 

—Old Smokers— The Queen Herb— Drinking Tobacco— Tobacco 
on the Stage — Shakespeare on Tobacco — Smoking Taught — Ben 
Jonson on the Weed— Curative Qualities — Modes of Use— Held 
up to Ridicule — Tirades against Tobacco — Tobacco Selling— Royal 
Haters of Tobacco — Old Customs — A Racy Poem — A Smoking 
Divine 80 

CHAPTER V. 

TOBACCO IN EUKOPE. — Continued. 

Popular use of Tobacco — Tobacco Glorified — Weight of Smoke — Anec- 
dotes — Triumph of Tobacco — A Government Monopoly — Tobacco a 
Blessing 1 1 1 

CHAPTER VI. 

TOBACCO PIPES, SMOKING AND SMOKERS. 

Indian Pipes — Material for Pipes — Legend of the Red Pipe — Chippewa 
Pipes — Making the Peace Pipes — South American Pipes — Cigar- 
ettes — Tobacco on the Amazon River — Brazilian Tobacco — Patago- 
nians as Smokers — Form and Material — Pipe of the Bobeen Indians 
— The War Pipe— Pipe Sculpture— Smoking in Alaska— Smoking 
in Russia — Smoking in Peru — Smoking in Turkey — Moderate Smok- 
ing—Female Smoking — Early Manufacture of Pipes — French Pipes. 124 

CHAPTER VII. 

PIPES AND SMOKERS. — Continued. 

Meerschaum Pipes — Coloring Meerschaums — The City of Smokers — 
Hudson as as moker — Persian Water Pipes — Turkish Pipes — Amber 
Mouth Pieces — Obtaining Amber — Its Value — Variety of Pipes — 
History of Pipes — Ancient Habit of Smoking — Buried Pipes — 
Jasmine Pipes — Smoking in Algiers — Smoking in Africa — Defence 
of Smoking — Tea and Tobacco — Chinese Pipes — Smoking in Japan 
— Tobacco Boxes — Tobacco Jars — Musings over a Pipe — Sad Fate of 
a Chewer — Triumph of the Anti's — The Smoker's Calendar — Doc- 
tor Parr as a Smoker — Smoking on the Battle-Field — Literary Smok- 
ers — Doctor Clarke on Tobacco — Noted Smokers — Pleasant Pipe 
— A Tobacco World — Cruelty of Smokers — Men like Pipes — Univer- 
sal Use 150 

CHAPTER VIII. 

SNUFF, SNUFF-BOXES AND SNUFF-TAKERS. 

Its Introduction — Boxes and Graters — Mode of Preparation — Snuff- 
Boxes — A Celebrated Manufacturer — The Snuffing Period — The 
Monk and his Snuff-Box — A Pinch of Snuff — Pleasures of Smelling 
— Frederick the Great — Eminent Snuff-Takers — The Story in 
Verse — " Come to my Nose " — Snuff Manufacture — Preparation of 
Tobacco — Grinding the Leaves — Flavoring the Snuff — Profits Made 
— Love of Tobacco — Chewing and Dipping — Advantages of Dipping 
— The First Snuffers — Famous Snuff-Takers — Snuff as a Pacificator 
— A National Stimulant — Different Tastes — Rise and Progress of 
Snuff-Taking 218 



CONTENTS. XV 

CHAPTER IX. 



New York Cigars — Havana Cigars — Quality of Havana Cigars — Relative 
Value and Size — Cigar-Makers — Cuban Cigars — Cigar Manufactories 
— Preparation of the Tobacco — Sorting the Leaves — Sales, etc. — 
Large Factories — Universal Smoking — Cigar Etiquette — Reveries 
— Summer-Day Thoughts — American Smokers — At Home — Senti- 
ment — Ode to a Cigar — Cigar-Lighters — Smoking an Art— Science 
of Lighting — Age of Fusees — "Home-Made Cigars" — Female 
Cigar-Makers — A Spicy Article — How to Smoke — Smoking Chris- 
tians — Lamb's Poem — Tobacco Compliment — Cigarette Smoking — 
Thomas Hood's Cigar — Lord Byron's Opinion — Kinds of Cigars — 
Selecting Cigars — Yara Cigars — Manilla Cigars — Swiss Cigars — 
Paraguay Cigars — Brazilian Cigars — American Cigars — Connecticut 
Seed Leaf and Havana Cigars — The Exile's Comforf 259 

CHAPTER X. 

TOBACCO PLANTERS AND PLANTATIONS. 

The Connecticut Planter— Intelligence of Tobacco Growers— Best 
Connecticut Seed Leaf — Love for the Plant — Virginia Planters — 
A Virginia Plantation — The Plant-Patch — Planting, Topping and 
Priming — Suckering — Crop-Gathering— Curing and Sorting — To- 
bacco Markets — Ohio Tobacco — Mode of Cure — Kentucky Tobacco- 
Growing — The Kentucky Planter — FloridaTobacco — Florida Planta- 
tation — Tobacco in Lousiana — California Tobacco Lands — Mexican 
Tobacco — Plants around Vera Cruz — Tobacco in St Domingo — 
Cuba Plantations — Mode of Working — Soil and Climate — Tobacco- 
Growing in Germany — Method of Culture — Extent of Culture — 
Tobacco-Raising in Prussia — Tobacco in Holland — Dutch Planters — 
A Plea for Tobacco — Tobacco Culture in Australia — Arabian Plan- 
tations — Tobacco in Africa — Syrian Tobacco — Latakia Tobacco — 
Growing Tobacco in India — Curing Tobacco in India — Turks Culti- 
vating Tobacco — Japanese Tobacco — Persian Tobacco — Tobacco 
Culture, Philippine Islands — Climate of the Islands — Fragrant 
Manillas— Tropical Tobacco. .] 311 

CHAPTER XI. 

VARIETIES. 

Kinds used for Cigars — Dwarf Tobacco — Havana Tobacco — Yara and 
Virginia Tobacco — James River Tobacco — Ohio Tobacco— South 
American Tobacco — Celebrated Brands of Tobacco — Russian 
Tobacco — Columbian Tobacco — Tobacco of Brazil — The Orinoco 
Tobacco — Persian Tobacco — French Tobacco — Spanish Tobacco — 
Japanese Tobacco — Manilla Tobacco 382 

CHAPTER XIL 
I 

TOBACCO HOUSES. 

Tobacco Sheds — Stripping Houses — Virginia Tobacco Sheds — Ordinary 
Sheds — Superior Sheds — Ohio Sheds — Kentucky, and Tennessee 
Sheds — Foreign Tobacco Sheds 405 



XVa CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER XIII. 

TOBACCO CULTURE. 

Hot Beds — Virginia Plant Patch — Tennessee Plant Bed— Cuban Plant 
Bed — Covering Plant Bed — Selection of Soil — The Soil Affecting 
Color — Preparing the Soil — Virginia Methods — Burning Brush — 
Implements— Transplanting Plants — Setting — Seasons in Mexico 
and Persia — The American Transplanter — Pests — Worming — Back- 
ward Plants — Topping — Suckers — Maturation — The Harvest — Cut- 
ting — Hanging — Cutting time in Cuba — Harvesting in Virginia — 
The Season in other Places — Curing — Curing by Smoke — Yellow- 
Tobacco — Stripping — Assorting — Shading— Stemming — Packing — 
Casing — Old Style— Kesistance- to Dampness— Prizing — Marking — 
Baling— Certificates— Firing— White Ru:^t— Seed Plants— Maturing 
of Seed— Second Growth 415 

CHAPTER XIV. 

THE PEODUCTION, COMMERCE AND MANUFACTUKE OF TOBACCO. 

Early History of Tobacco— Cultivation by Spaniards at St. Domingo^- 
Annual Product of Cuba — Amount of Land under Cultivation in 
U. S.— Cultivation in the South — Annual Product of Europe, Asia 
and Africa— Government Monopoly— Source of Revenue- Manu- 
facture of Cigarettes — Increase of Tobacco Culture 478 



CHAPTER I. 



THE TOBACCO PLANT. 




OBACCO is a hardy flowering annual* plant, 
growing freely in a moist fertile soil and requiring 
the most thorough culture in order to secure the 
finest form and quality of leaf. It is a native of the 
tropics and under the intense rays of a vertical sun develops 
its finest and most remarkable flavor which far surpasses the 
varieties grown in a temperate region. It however readily 
adapts itself to soil and climate growing through a wide 
range of temperature from the Equator to Moscow in Rus- 
sia in latitude 56'^, and through all the intervening range 
of climate f. 

The plant varies in height according to species and locality ; 
the largest varieties reaching an altitude of ten or twelve feet, 
in others not growing more than two or three feet from the 
ground. Botanists have enumerated between forty and fifty 
varieties of the tobacco plant who class them all among the 
narcotic poisons. When properly cultivated the plant ripens 
in a few weeks growing with a rapidity hardly equaled by 
any product eitlier temperate or tropical. Of the large 
number of varieties cultivated scarcely more than one-half 
are grown to any great extent while many of them are hardly 
known outside of the limit of cultivation. Tobacco is a 
strong growing plant resisting heat and drought to a far 

* The greater number of the species are annual plants ; hut two at least are perennial ; the 
Mcotiana fruticosa, which is a shrub, a native of the Cape of Good Hope, and of China; and 
JV. urens, a native of South America. 

tXatham says that the tobacco plant is peculiarly adapted for an agricultural comparison 
of climates. 

2 



18 BOTANICAL DESCRIPTION. 

greater extent than most plants. It is a native of America, 
the discovery of the continent and the plant occurring almost 
simultaneously^ It succeeds best in a deep rich loam in a 
climate ranging from forty to fifty degrees of latitude. After 
having been introduced and cultivated in nearly all parts of 
the world, America enjoys the reputation of growing the 
finest varieties known to commerce. European tobacco is 
lacking in flavor and is less powerful than the tobacco of 
America. 

The botanical account of tobacco is as follows : — 

"Nicotiana, the tobacco plant is a genus of plants of the 
order of Monogynia, belonging to the pentandria class, order 
1, of class y. It bears a tubular 5-cleft calyx ; a funnel- 
formed corolla, with a plaited 5-cleft border ; the stamina 
inclined ; the stigma capitate; the capsule 2-celled, and 2 to 
4 valved." 

A more general description of the plant is given by an 
American w^riter: — 

" The tobacco plant is an annual growing from eighteen 
inches (dwarf tobacco) to seven or eight feet in height*. It 
bears numerous leaves of a pale green color sessile, ovate 
lanceolate and pointed in form, which come out alternately 
from two to three inches apart. The flowers grow in loose 
panicles at the extremity of the stalks, and the calyx is bell- 
sliaped, and divided at its summit into five pointed segments. 
The tube of the corolla expands at the top into an oblong 
cup terminating in a 5-lobed plaited rose-colored border. 
The pistil consists of an oval germ, a slender style longer 
tlian the stamen, and a cleft stigma. The flowers are suc- 
ceeded by capsules of 2 cells opening at the summit and 
containing numerous kidney-shajDed seeds." 

Two of the finest varieties of Nicotiana Tobacum that are 
cultivated are the Oronoco and the Sweet Scented ; they differ 
only in the form of the leaves, those of the latter variety being 
shorter and broader than the other. They are annual herba- 
ceous plants, rising with strong erect stems to the height of 
from six to nine feet, with fine handsome foliage. The stalk 
near the root is often an inch or more in diameter, and 



• An old English writer in describing tobacco says :— *' When at its just height, It is as tall 
as an ordinary sized man." 



ANCIENT DESCRIPTION. 19 

surrounded by a liairj clammy substance, of a greenish yellow 
color. The leaves are of a light green ; they grow alternately, 
at intervals of two or three inches on the stalk ; they are 
oblong and spear-shaped ; those lowest on the stalk are about 
twenty inches in length, and they decrease as they ascend. 

The young leaves when about six inches, are of a deep 
green color and rather smooth, and as they approach maturity 
they become yellowish and rougher on the surface. The 
flowers grow in clusters from the extremities of the stalk ; 
they are yellow externally and of a delicate red within. They 
are succeeded hy kidney shaped ca2:>sules of a brown color. 

Thompson in his " Notices relative to Tobacco " describes 
the tobacco plant as follows: — • 

"The species of Nicotiana which M'as first known, and 
which still furnishes the greatest supply of Tobacco, is the 
N. tobacum, an annual plant, a native of South America, but 
naturaliz;ed to our climate. It is a tall, not inelegant plant, 
rising to the height of about six feet, with a strong, round, 
villous, slightly viscid stem, furnished with alternate leaves, 
which are sessile, or clasp the stems: and are decurrent, lan- 
ceolate, entire ; of a full green on the upper surface, and pale 
on the under. 

" In a vigorous plant, the lower leaves are about twenty 
inches in length, and from three to five in breadth, decreasing 
as they ascend. The inflorescence, or flowering part of the 
stem, is terminal, loosely branching in that form which 
botanists term a panicle, with long, linear floral leaves or 
bractes at the oi'igin of each division. 

" The flowers, which bloom in July and August, are of a 
pale pink or rose color : the calyx, or flower-cup, is bell-shaped, 
obscurely pentangular, villous, slightly viscid, and presenting 
at the margin five acute, erect segments. The corolla is 
twice tlie length of the calyx, viscid', tubular below, swelling 
above into 'an oblong cup, and expanding at the lip into five 
somewhat plaited, pointed segments; the seed vessel is an 
oblpng or ovate capsule, containing numerous reniform seeds, 
which are ripe in September and October ; and if not collected, 
are shed by 'the capsule opening at the apex." 

In Stevens and Liebault's Maison Rustique, or the Country 
Farm, (London, 1606), is found the following curious account 
of the tobacco plant : — 



20 ANCIENT PLANT-BED. 

"This herbe resembleth in figure fashion, and qualities, 
the great comfrey in such sort as that a man woulde deeme 
it to be a kinde of great comfrey, rather than a yellow hen- 
bane, as some have thought. 

" It hath an upright stalke, not bending any way, thicke, 
bearded or hairy, and slimy : the leaves are broad and long, 
greene, drawing somewhat towards a yellow, bearded or 
hoarrie, but smooth and slimie, having as it were talons, but 
not either notched or cut in. the edges, a great deale bigger 
downward toward the root than above : while it is young it 
is leaved, as it were lying upon the ground, but rising to a 
stalke and growing further, it ceaseth to have such a number 
of leaves below, and putteth forth branches from half foot to 
half, and storeth itselfe, by that meanes M'ith leaves, and* still 
riseth higher from the height of four or five foote, unto three 
or four or five cubits according as is sown in a hot and fat 
ground, and carefully tilled. The boughs and branches 
tliereof put out at joints, and divide the stalk by distance of 
halfe a foote : the highest of which branches are bigger than 
an arm 8, 

"At the tops and ends of his branches and boughs, it put- 
teth foorth flowers almost like those of Nigella, of a whitish 
and incarnate color, having the fashion of a little bell com- 
ming out of a swad or husk, being of the fashion of a small 
goblet, which husk becometh round, having the fashion of a 
little apple, or sword's pummell : as soon as the flower is 
gone and vanished away, it is filled with very small seedes 
like unto those of yellow henbane, and tliey are black when 
they be ripe, or greene, while they are not yet ripe. 

" In a hot countree it beareth leaves, flowers, and seeds at 
the same time, in the ninth or tenth month of the year it 
putteth foorth young cions at the roote, and reneweth itself 
by this store and number of cions, and great quantity of 
sprouts, and yet notwithstanding the roots are little, small, 
fine thready strings, or if otherwise they grow a little thick, 
yet remaine they still very short, in respect of the height of 
the plant. The roots and leaves do yield a glewish and 
rosinith kind of juice, somewhat yellow, of a rosinlike smell, 
not unpleasant, and of a sharpe, eager and biting taste, which 
sheweth that it is by nature hot, wliereupon M-e must gather 
that it is no kind of yellow henbane as some have thought. 
Nicotiana craveth a fat ground well stird, and well manured 
also in this cold countrie (England) that is to say an earth, 
■wherein the manure is so well mingled and incorporated, as 



THE PLANT. 21 

that it becometh earthie, that is to say, all turned into earth, 
and not making any shew any more of dung : which is like- 
wise moist and shadowie, wide and roomy, for in a narrow 
and straight place it would not grow high, straight, great and 
well-branched. 

" It desireth the South sun before it, and a wall behind it, 
which may stand in stead of a broad pair of shoulders to keep 
away the northern wind and to beate backe againe the heat of 
the sun. It groweth the better if it be oft watered, and 
maketh itself sport and jolly good cheer with water when the 
time becometh a little dry. It hateth cold, and therefore to 
keepe it from dying in winter, it must be either kept in cel- 
lars where it may have free benefit of air, or else in some 
cave made on purpose within the same garden, or else to 
cover it as with a cloak very well with a double mat, making 
a penthouse of wicker work from the wall to cover the head 
thereof with straw laid thereupon : and when the southern 
sun shineth, to open the door of the covert made for the said 
herb right upon the said South sun." 

The most ludicrous part of " The discourse on Nicotian " 
will be found in that portion which relates to the making of 
the plant-bed and transplanting : — 

" For to sow it, you must make a hole in the earth with 
your finger and that as deep as your finger is long, then you 
must cast into the same hole ten or twelve seeds of the said 
Nicotiana together, and fill up the hole again : for it is so 
small, as that if you should put in but four or five seeds the 
earth would choake it : and if the time be dry, you must 
water the place easily some five days after : And when the 
herb is grown out of the earth, inasmuch as every seed will 
have put up his sprout and stalk, and tliat the small thready 
roots are intangled the one within the other, you must with 
a great knife make a composs within the earth in the places 
about this plot where they grow and take up the earth and 
all together, and cast them into a bucket full of water, to the 
end that the earth may be seperated, and the small and ten- 
der impes swim about the water ; and so you shall sunder 
them one after another without breaking of them." * * 

THE STALK. 
The Tobacco stalk varies with the varieties of the plant. 
All of the species cultivated in the United States have stalks 
of a large size — much larger than many varieties grown in 



22 



TOBACCO PLANT. 




TOBACCO STALKS. 



the tropics. Those of some species of tobacco are little and 

easily broken, which to a certain extent is the ease with most 

varieties of the plant when maturing very fast. The stalks 

of some plants are rough and uneven, 

while those of others are smooth. 

Nearly all, including most of those 

grown in Europe and America, have 

erect, round, hair}^, viscid stalks, and 

large, fibrous roots ; while that of 

Spanish as well as dwarf tobacco is 

harder and much smaller. The stalk 

is composed of a wood-like substance 

containing a glutinous pith, and is 

of about the same shade of color as 

the leaves. As the plant develops 

in size the stalk hardens, and when 

fully grown is not easily broken. 

The size of the stalk corresponds with that of the leaves, 
and with such varieties of the plant as Connecticut seed leaf, 
Virginia, Kentucky, Ohio, St. Domingo, and some others ; 
both will be found to be larger than Spanish, Latakia, and 
Syrian tobacco, which have a much smaller but harder stalk. 
It will readily be seen that the stalk must be strong and firm 
in order to support the large palm-like leaves which on some 
varieties grow to a length of nearly four feet with a corre- 
sponding breadth. The stalk does not "cure down" as fast 
as the leaves, which is thought now to be necessary in order 
to prevent sweating, as well as to hasten the curing. Most 
of the varieties of the plant have an erect, straight stalk, 
excepting Syrian tobacco, which near the top describes more 
of a semi-circle, but not to that extent of giving an idea of 
an entirely crooked plant. The stalk gradually tapers from 
the base to the summit, and wlien deprived of its leaves 
presents a smooth appearance not unlike that of a small tree 
or shrub deprived of its twigs and leaves. 

THE LEAVES. 
The Plant bears from eight to twenty leaves according to 



DESCRIPTION OF THE LEAVES. 23 

the species of the plant. They have various forms, ovate, 
lanceolate, and jDointed. Leaves of a lanceolate form are the 
largest, and the shape of those found on most varieties of the 
American plant. The color of the leaves when growing, as 
well as after curing and sweating, varies, and is frequently 
caused by the condition of the soil. The color while grow- 
ing may be either a light or dark green, which changes to a 
yellowish cast as the plant matures and ripens. The ground 
leaves are of a lighter color and ripen earlier than the rest — 
sometimes turning yellow, and during damp weather rotting 
and dropping from the stalk. Some varieties of the plant, 
like Latakia, bear small but thick leaves, which after cutting 
are very thin and fine in texture ; while others, like Connecti- 
cut seed leaf and Havana, bear leaves of a medium thickness, 
which are also fine and silky after curing. But while the 
color of ^the plant when growing is either a light or dark 
green, it rapidly changes during curing, and especially after 
passing through the sweat, changing to a light or dark cinna- 
mon like Connecticut seed leaf, black like Holland and 
Perique tobacco, bright yellow of the finest shade of Virginia 
and Carolina leaf, brown like Sumatra, or dark red like that 
known by the name of " Boshibaghli," grown in Asia Minor. 
The leaves are covered with glandular hairs containing a 
glutinous substance of an unpleasant odor, which characterizes 
all varieties as well as nearly all parts of the plant. 

The leaves of all varieties of tobacco grow the entire 
length of the stem and clasp the stalk, excepting those of 
Syrian, which are attached by a long stem. The size of the 
leaves, as well as the entire plant, is now much larger than 
when first discovered. One of the early voyagers describes 
the plant as short and bearing leaves of about the size and 
shape of the walnut. In many varieties the leaves grow in a 
semi-circular form while in others they grow almost straight 
and still others growing erect presenting a singular appear- 
ance. The stem or mid-rib running through the leaf is large 
and fibrous and its numerous smaller veins proportionally 
larger which on curing become smaller and particularly in 



24 COLOR OF LEAVES. 

those kinds best adapted for cigar wrappers. The leaves 
from the base to the center of the plant are of about equal 
size but are smaller as thej reach the summit, but after 





TOBACCO LEAVES. 



topping attain about the same size as the others. The color 
of the leaf after curing may be determined by the color of 
the leaf while growing — if dark green while maturing in the 
field, the color will be dark after curing and sweating and 
the reverse if of a lighter shade of green. 

If the soil be dark the color of the leaf will be darker than 
if grown upon a light loam. Some varieties of the j^lant 
have leaves of a smooth glossy appearance while others are 
rough and the surface uneven — more like a cabbage leaf, a 
peculiar feature of the tobacco of Syria. The kind of fertil- 
izers applied to the soil also in a measure as well as the soil 
itself has much to do with the texture or body of the leaf 
and should be duly considered by all growers of the plant. 
A light moist loam should be chosen for the tobacco field if 
a leaf of light color and texture is desired while if a dark leaf 
is preferred th^ soil chosen should be a moist heavy loam. 

THE FLOWER. 

The flowers of the tobacco plant grow in a bunch or cluster 
on the summit of the plant and are of a pink, yellow, or 
purple white color according to the variety of the plant. On 
most varieties the color of the flowers is pink excepting 
Syrian or Latakia which bears yellow flowers while those of 



BLOSSOMS. 



25 



Shiraz or Persian and Guatemala are white while those of the 
Japan tobacco, are purple. The segments of the corolla are 
pointed but on some varieties unequal, particularly that of 
Shiraz tobacco. The flowers impart a pleasant odor doubt- 
less to all lovers of the weed but to all others a compound of 
villainous smells among which and above all the rest may be 
recognized an odor suggestive of the leaves of the plant. 
When in full blossom a tobacco field forms a pleasant 



AAA 





BUD AND FLOWERS. 



feature of a landscape which is greatly heightened if the 
plants are large and of equal size. The pink flowers are the 
largest while those of a yellow color are the smallest. The 
plant comes into blossom a few weeks before fully ripe when 
with a portion of the stalk they are broken off to hasten the 
ripening and maturing of the leaves. After the buds appear 
they blossom in a few days and remain in full bloom two or 
three weeks, when they perish like the blossoms of other 
plants and flowers. The flowers of Havana tobacco are 
of a lighter pink than those of Connecticut tobacco but are 
rot as large — a trifle larger however than those of Latakia 
tobacco. Those varieties of the tobacco plant bearing pink 
flowers are the finest flavored and are used chiefly for the 
manufacture of cigars while those bearing yellow flowers are 
better adapted for cutting purposes and the pipe. 

The American varieties of tobacco bear a larger number of 



26 THE CAPSULE AND SEED. 

flowers than European tobaccos or those of Africa or Asia. 
The color of the flowers remain the same whether cultivated 
in one country or another while the leaves may grow larger 
or smaller according to the system of cultivation adopted. 
Those varieties of the plant w^itli heart-shaped leaves have 
paniculated flowers with nnequal cups. The flower stems on 
the American varieties are much longer than those of Euro- 
pean tobaccos and also larger. The season has much to do 
with the size of the flowers ; as if very dry they are usually 
smaller and not as numerous as if grown under more favorable 
circumstances. 

THE CAPSULE. 

As soon as the flowers drop from the fruit bud the 
capsules grow very rapidly until they have attained full 
size — which occurs only in those plants which have been 
left for seed and remain untopped. When topped they are 
not usually full grown — as some growers top the plants when 
just coming into blossom, while others prefer to top the 
plants when in full bloom and others still when the blossoms 
begin to fall. The fruit is described by "Wheeler " as a capsule 
of a nearly oval flgure. There is a line on each side of it, 
and it contains two cells, and opens at the top. The recepta- 
cles one of a half-oval figure, punctuated and affixed to the sep- 
arating body. The seeds are numerous, kidney-shaped, and 
rugose." 

Most growers of the plant would describe the fruit bud as 
follows : In form resembling an acorn though more pointed 
at the top ; in some species, of a dark brown in others of a 
light brown color, containing two cells filled with seeds 
similar in shape to the fruit bud, but not rugose as described 
by some botanists. Some writers state that each cell contains 
about one thousand seeds. The fruit buds of Connecticut, 
Virginia, Kentucky and Ohio Tobacco as well as of most of 
the varieties grown within the limits of the United States are 
much larger than those of Havana, Yara, Syrian, and 
numerous other species of the plant, while the color of these 
last named varieties is a lio;hter shade of brown. The color 



SELECTION FOR SEED. » 27 

of the seed also varies according to the varieties of the plant. 
The seeds of some species are of a dark brown while others 
are of a lighter shade. The seeds, however, are so small that 
the variety to which they belong cannot be determined 
except by planting or sowing them. 

The plants selected for seed are usually left growing until 
late in the season, and at night should be protected from the 
cold and frost by a light covering of some kind — this may 
not be absolutely necessary, as most growers of tobacco have 
often noticed young plants growing around the base or roots 
of the seed stalk — the seeds of which germinated although 






CAPSULES, (fruit BUD.) 

remaining in the ground during the winter. Strong, healthy 
plants generally produce large, well filled capsules the only 
ones to be selected by the grower if large, fine plants are 
desired. Many growers of tobacco have doubtless examined 
the capsules of some species of the plant and frequently 
observed that the capsules or fruit buds are often scarcely 
more than half-filled while others contain but a few seeds. 
The largest and finest capsules on the plant mature first, 
while the smaller ones grow much slower and are frequently 
several weeks changing from green to brown. Many of the 
capsules do not contain any seed at all. 

THE SUCKER. 

The offshoots or suckers as they are termed, make their 
appearance at the junction of the leaves and stalk, about the 
roots of the plant, the result of that vigorous growth caused 
by topping. The suckers can hardly be seen until after the 



28 



SUCKERS. 



plant has been topped, when they come forward rapidly and 
in a short time develop into strong, vigorous shoots. Tatham 
describing the sucker says : 

" The sucker is a superfluous sprout which is wont to make 
its appearance and shoot forth from the stem or stalk, near 
to the junction of the leaves with the stems, and about the 
root of the plant, and if allowed to grow, injuring the market- 
able quality of the tobacco by compelling a division of its 
nutriment during the act of maturation. The planter is 
therefore careful to destroy these intruders with the thumb 
nail, as in the act of topping. This superfluity of vegetation, 
like that of the top, has been often the subject of legislative 
care ; and the policy of supporting the good name of the 
Virginia produce has dictated the wisdom of penal laws to 
maintain her good faith against imposition upon strangers 
who trade with her." 

The ripening of the suckers not only proves injurious to 
the quality of the leaf but retards their size and maturity 
and if allowed to continue, prevents them from attaining 
their largest possible growth. 

On large, strong, growing plants the growth of suckers ia 




very rank after attaining a length of from six to ten inches, 
and when fully grown bearing flowers like the parent stalk. 
After growing for a length of time they become tough and 
attached so firmly to the stem of the leaf and stalk that they 



NICOTINE QUALITIES. 29 

are broken off with difficulty, frequently detaching the leaf 
with them. The growth of the suckers, however, determines 
the quality as well as the maturity of the plants. 

Weak, spindling plants rarely produce large, vigorous 
shoots,, the leaves of such suckers are generally small and of 
a yellowish color. When the plants are fully ripe and ready 
to harvest the suckers will be found to be growing vigorously 
around the root of the plant. This is doubtless the best 
evidence of its maturity, more reliable by far than any other 
as it denotes the ripening of the entire plant. Suckering 
the plants hastens the ripening of the leaves, and gives a 
lighter shade of color, no matter on what soil the plants are 
grown. Having treated at some length of the various parts 
of the tobacco plant — stalk, leaves, flowers, capsules and 
suckers" we come now to its nicotine properties. The 
tobacco plant, as is well known, produces a virulent poison 
known as Nicotine. This property, however, as well as 
others as violent is found in many articles of food, includ- 
ing the potato together with its stalk and leaves ; the effects 
of which may be experienced by chewing a small quantity 
of the latter. The New Edinburgh Encyclopedia says : 

" The peculiar effect produced by using tobacco bears some 
resemblance to intoxication and is excited by an essential 
oil which in its pure state is so powerful as to destroy life 
even in very minute quantity." 

Chemistry has taught us that nicotine is only one among 
many principles which are contained in the plant. It is 
supposed by many but not substantiated by chemical 
research that nicotine is not the flavoring agent which gives 
tobacco its essential and peculiar varieties of odor. Such 
are most probably given by the essential oils, which vary in 
amount in different species of the plant. 

An English writer says : 

" Nicotine is disagreeable to the habitual smoker, as is 
proved by the increased demand for clean pipes or which by 
some mechanical contrivance get rid of the nicotine." 

The late Dr. Blotin tested by numerous experiments the 
effects of nicotine on the various parts of the organization of 



30 • MEDICINAL PROPERTIES. 

man. While the physiological effects of nicotine may bo 
interesting to the medical practitioner, they will hardly inter- 
est the general reader unless it can be shown that the eiFects 
of nicotine and tobacco shonld be proved to be indentical. 

We are loth to leave this subject, however, as it is so 
intimately connected with the history of the plant, without 
treating somewhat of its medicinal properties which to many 
are of more interest than its social qualities. The Indians 
not only used the plant socially, religiously, but medicinally. 
Their Medicine men prescribed its use in various ways for 
most diseases common among them. The use thus made of 
the plant attracted the attention of the Spanish and English, 
far more than its use either as a means of enjoyment or as a 
religious act. When introduced to the Old World, its claims 
as a remedy for most diseases gave it its popularity and 
served to increase its use. It was styled '■'■ Sana sancta 
Indorum — " " Herbe jpropre a tous maxix^'' and physicians 
claimed that it was " the most sovereign and precious weed 
that ever the earth tendered to the use of man." As early 
as 1610, three years after the London and Plymouth Compa- 
nies settled in Virginia, and some years before it began to be 
cultivated by them as an article of export, it had attracted 
the attention of English physicians, who seemed to take as 
much delight in writing of the sanitary uses of the herb as 
they did in smoking the balmy leaves of the plant. 

i)r. Edmund Gardiner, " Practitioner of Physicke," issued 
in 1610 a volume entitled, "The Triall of Tobacco," setting 
forth its curative powers. Speaking of its use he says : 

" Tobacco is not violent, and therefore may in my judge- 
ment bee safely put in practise. Thus then you plainly sec 
that all medicines, and especially tobacco, being rightly and 
rationally used, is a noble medicine and contrariwise not in 
his due time with other circumstances considered, it doth no 
more than a nobleman's shooe doth in healing the gout in 
the foot." 

Dr. Yerner of Bath, in his Treatise concerning the taking 
the fume of tobacco (163Y) says that when " taken moderately 
and at fixed times with its proper adjunct, which (as they doe 



IMPROVEMENT IN PLANTS. 31 

suppose) is a cnp of sack, they think it be no bad physick." 
Dr. William Barclay in his work on Tobacco, (1614) 
declares " that it worketh wonderoiis cures." He not only 
defends the herb but the " land where it groweth." At this 
time the tobacco plant like Indian Corn was very small, 
possessing but few of the qualities now required to make it 
merchantable, When first exported to Sj^ain and Portugal 
from the West Indies and South America, and even by the 
English from Virginia, the leaf was dark in color and strong 
and rank in flavor. This, however, seems to have been the 
standard in regard to some varieties while others are spoken 
of by some of the early writers npon tobacco as " sweet." 

The tobacco (uppowoc) grown by the Indians in America, 
at the time of its discovery, and more particularly in North 
America, would compare better with the suckers of the 
largest varieties of the plant rather than with even the small- 
est species of the plant now cultivated. At the present time 
tobacco culture is considered a science in order to secure the 
colors in demand, and that are fashionable, and also the 
right texture of leaf now so desirable in all tobaccos designed 
for wrappers. Could the Indians, who cultivated the plant 
on the banks of the James, the Amazon and other rivers of 
America, now look upon the plant growing in rare luxuriance 
upon the same fields where they first raised it, they could 
hardly realize them to be the same varieties that they had 
previously planted. 




CHAPTER II. 
TOBACCO, rrs discoveey. 

'EARLY four hundred years have passed away 
since the tobacco plant and its use was introduced 
to the civilized world. It was in the month of 
November, 1492, that the sailors of Columbus in 
exploring the island of Cuba first noted the mode of using 
tobacco. They found the Indians carrying lighted firebrands 
(as they at first supposed) and puffed the smoke inhaled from 
their mouths and nostrils. 

The Spaniards concluded that this was a method common 
with them of perfuming themselves; but its frequent use soon 
taught them that it was the dried leaves of a plant which 
they burned inhaling and exhaling the smoke. It attracted 
the attention of the Spaniards no less from its novelty than 
from the effect produced by the indulgence. 

The use of tobacco by the Indians was entirely new to the 
Spanish discoverers and when in 1503 they landed in various 
parts of South America they found that both chewing and 
smoking the herb was a common custom with the natives. 
But while the Indians and their habits attracted the attention 
of the Spanish sailors Columbus was more deeply interested 
in the great continent and the luxuriant tropical growth to 
be seen on every hand. Columbus himself says of it : — 

"Everything invited me to settle here. The beauty of 
the streams, the clearness of the water, through which I 
could see the sandy bottom ; the multitude of palm-trees of 
different kinds, the tallest and finest I had ever seen ; and 
an infinite number of other large and flourishing trees ; the 



EARLY USE. 



33 



birds, and the verdure of the plains, are so amazingly beauti- 
ful, that this country excelles all others as far as the day sur- 
passes the night in splendor." 

Lowe, gives the following account of the discovery of 
tobacco and its uses : — 

" The discovery of this plant is supposed to have been 
made by Fernando Cortez in Yucatan in the Gulf of Mexico, 
where he found it used universally, and held in a species of 
veneration by the simple natives. He made himself ac- 
quainted with the uses and supposed virtues of the plant and 
the manner of cultivating it, and sent plants to Spain, as part 
of the spoil^ and treasures of his new-found World." 

Oviedo* is the first author who gives a clear account of 
smoking among the Indians of Hispaniolaf. He alludes to 
it as one of their evil customs and used by them to produce 
insensibility. Their mode of using 
it was by inhalation and expelling^ 
the smoke through the nostrils by 
means of a hollow forked cane or 
hollow reed. Oviedo describes them 
as " about a span long ; and when 
used the forked ends are inserted in 
the nostrils, the other end being ap- 
plied to the burning leaves of the 
herb, using the herb in this manner 
stupefied them producing a kind of 
intoxication." 

Of the early accounts of the plant and its use, Beckman a 
German writer says : — 

" In 1496, Eomanus Pane, a Spanish monk, whom Colum- 
bus, on his second departure from America, had left in that 
country, published the first account of tobacco with which he 
became acquainted in St. Domingo. He gave it the name of 
Cohoba Cohobba, Gioia. In 1535, the negroes had already 
habituated themselves to the use of tobacco, and cultivated it 
in the plantations of their masters. Europeans likewise al- 
ready smoked it." 

An early writer thus alludes to the use of tobacco among 
the East Indians : — 




PRIMITITB PIPE. 



*Hl8torla General de loB IndiOB 1526. 
t St. Domingo. 

3 



34: ORIGIN OF ITS NAME. 

" The East Indians do use to make little balls of the juice 
of the hearbe tobaco and the ashes of cockle-shells wrought 
up together, and dryed in the shadow, and in their travaile 
they place one of the balls between their neatber lip and 
their teeth, sucking the same continually, and letting down 
the moysture, and it keepeth them both from hunger and 
thirst for the space of three or four days." 

Oviedo says of the implements used by the Indians in 
smoking : — 

" The hollow cane used by them is called tobaco and that 
that name is not given to the plant or to the stupor caused by 
its use." 

A writer alluding to the same subject says : — 

" The name tobacco is supposed to be derived from the In- 
dian tobaccos, given by the Caribs to the pipe in which they 
smoked the plant." 

Others derive it from Tabasco, a province of Mexico ; 
others from the island of Tobago one of the Caribbees'; and 
others from Tobasco in the gulf of Florida. 

Tomilson says : — 

" The word tobacco appears to have been applied by the 
caribbees to the pipe in which they smoked the herb while 
the Spaniards distinguished the herb itself by that name. 
The more probable derivation of the word is from a place 
called Tobaco in Yucatan from which the herb was first sent 
to the New World." 

Humboldt says concerning the name : — 

"The word Tobacco like maize, savannah, cacique, maguey 
(agave) and manato, belong to the ancient language of Hayti, 
or St. Domingo. It did not properly denote the herb, but 
the tube through which the smoke was inhaled. It seems 
surprising that a vegetable production so universally spread 
should have different names among neighboring people. Tlie 
pete-ma of the Omaguas is, no doubt, the pety of the Gua- 
ranos; but the analogy between the Cabre and Algonkin (or 
Lenni-Lennope) words which denote tobacco may be merely 
accidental. Tbe following are the synonymes in five lan- 
guages : Aztec or Mexican, yetli Huron, oyngona', Peruvian, 
sayrij Brazil, jpiecelt; Moxo, sabareP 

Koman Pane who accompanied Columbus on his second 
voyage alludes to another method of using the herb. They 



EARLY SNUFF-TAKING. 35 

make a powder of the leaves, which " they take through a 
cane half a cubit long ; one end of this they place in the 
nose, and the other upon the powder, and so draw it up, 
which purges them very much." 

This is doubtless the first account that we have of snuff- 
taking ; Fairholt says concerning its use : — 

"Its effects upon the Indians in both instances seem to 
have been more violent and peculiar than upon Europeans 
since." 

This may be accounted for from the fact of the imperfect 
method of curing tobacco adopted by them and all of the 
natives up to the period of the settlement of Virginia by the 
English, f As nearly all of the early voyagers allude to the 
plant ana especially to its use it would seem probable that it 
had been cultivated from time immemorial by all the native 
people of the Orinoco ; and at the period of the conquest the 
habit of smoking was found to be alike spread over both 
ISTorth and South America. The Tamanacs and the May- 
pures of Guiana wrap maize leaves round their cigars as the 
Mexicans did at the time of the arrival of Cortez. The. 
Spaniards since have substituted paper for the leaves of 
maize, in imitation of them. 

" The poor Indians of the forests of the Orinoco know as 
well as did the great nobles at 
the court of Montezuma, that 
the smoke of tobacco is an ex- 
cellent narcotic ; and they use 
it not only to procure their 
afternoon nap, but also to put^ 
themselves in that state of qui- C 
escence which they call dream- 
ing with the eyes open or day O 
dreaming." ^{ 

Tobacco at this period was "^ 
also rolled up in the leaves of 
the Palm and smoked. Colum- 
bus found the natives of San ^^^^^^ ^^^^^^^ 
Salvador smoking after this 
manner. Lobel in his History of Plants* gives an engraving 

• flUtory ot Plants, 1576. 




36 TOBACCO IN MEXICO. 

of a native smoking one of these rolls or primitive cigars 
and speaks of their general use by Captains of ships trading 
to the West Indies. 

But not only was snufF taking and the nse of tobacco rolls 
or cigars noted by European voyagers, but the use of the pipe 
also in some parts of America, seemed to be a common cus- 
tom especially among the chiefs. Be Bry in his History of 
Brazil (1590) describes its use and also some interesting 
particulars concerning the plant. Their method of curing 
the leaves was to air-dry them and then packing them until 
wanted for use. In smoking he says : — 

" When the leaves are well dried they place in the open 
part of a pipe of which on burning, the smoke is inhaled 
into the mouth by the more narrow part of the pipe, and so 
strongly that it flows out of the mouth and nostrils, and by 
that means effectually drives out humours." 

Fairholt in alluding to the various uses of the herb among 
the Indians says : — 

" We can thus trace to South America, at the period when 
the New World was first discovered, every mode of using the 
tobacco plant which the Old World has indulged in ever 
since." 

This statement is not entirely correct — the mode of using^ 
tobacco in Norway by plugging the nostrils with small pieces 
of tobacco seems to have been unknown among the Indians 
of America as it is now with all other nationalities, excepting- 
the Norwegians. 

When Cortez made conquest of Mexico in 1519 smoking- 
seemed to be a common as well as an ancient custom among 
the natives. Benzoni in his History of the New World * 
describing his travels in America gives a detailed account of 
the plant and their method of curing and using it. In both 
North and South America the use of tobacco seemed to be 
universal among all the tribes and beyond all question the 
custom of using the herb had its origin among them. The 
traditions of the Indians all confirm its ancient source ; they 
considered the plant as a gift from the Great Spirit for their 



* From 1541 to 1556. 



COMPARATIVE QUALITIES OF TOBACCO. 37 

comfort and enjoyment and one wliicb the Great Spirit also 
indulged in, consequently with them smoking partook of the 
character of a moral if not a religious act. The use of tobacco 
in sufficient quantities to produce intoxication seemed to be a 
favorite remedy for most diseases among them and was 
administered by their doctors or medicine-men in large quan- 
tities. Benzoni gives an engraving of their mode of inhaling 
the smoke and says of its use : — 

"In La Espanola, when their doctors wanted to cure a 
sick man, they went to the place where they were to ad- 
minister the smoke, and when he was thoroughly intoxicated 
by it, the cure was mostly effected. On returning to his 
senses he told a thousand stories of his having been at the 
council of the gods, and other high visions." 
/ It can hardly be supposed that while the custom of using 
/ tobacco among the Indians in both North and South America 
I was very general and the mode of use the same, that the 
plant grown was of the same quality in one part as in another. 
While the rude culture of the natives would hardly tend to 
an improvement in quality ; the climate being varied would 
no doubt have much to do with the size and quality of the 
plant. This would seem the more probable for as soon as its 
cultivation began in Virginia by the English colonists it had 
successful rivals in the tobacco of the West Indies and South 
America. Kobertson says : — 

" Yirginia tobacco was greatly inferior to that raised by the 
Spaniards in the West Indies and which sold for six times as 
much as Yirginia tobacco." * 

But not only has the name tobacco and the implements 
employed in its use caused much discussion but also the 
origin of the plant. 

Some writers affirm that it came from Asia and that it was 

^ first grown in China having been used by the Chinese long 

( before the narcotic properties of opium were known. Tatham 

in his work on Tobacco says of its origin in substantial 

agreement with La Bott : — 

"It is generally understood that the tobacco plant of 



■ West India tobacco sold for 18 shillings per pound and Virginia for 3 8. 



38 ORIGIN OF THE PLANT. 

Yirginia is a native production of the country ; but whether 
it was found in a state of natural growth there, or a plant 
cultivated by the Indian natives, is a point of which we are 
not informed, nor which ever can be farther elucidated than 
by the corroboration of historical facts and conjectures. I 
have been thirty years ago, and the greatest part of my time 
during that period, intimately acquainted with the interior 
parts of America ; and have been much in the unsettled parts, 
of the country, among those kinds of soil which are favora- 
ble to the cultivation of tobacco ; but I do not recollect one 
single instance where I have met with tobacco growing wild 
in the woods, although I have often found a few spontaneous 
plants about the arable and trodden grounds of deserted 
habitations. This circumstance, as well as that of its being^ 
now, and having been, cultivated by the natives at the period 
of European discoveries, inclines towards a supposition that 
this plant is not a native of North America, but may possibly 
have found its way thither with the earliest migrations from 
some distant land. This might, indeed, have easily been the 
case from South America, by way of the Isthmus of Panama ; 
and the foundation of the Choctaw and Chickasaw nations 
(who we have reasons to consider as descendants from the 
Tloseolians, and to have migrated to the eastward of the 
river Mississippi, about the time of the Spanish conquest of 
Mexico by Cortez), seems to have afforded one fair oppor- 
tunity for its dissemination." 

The first knowledge which the English discoverers had of 
the plant was in 1565 when they found it growing in Florida, 
one hundred and seventy-three years after it was first dis- 
covered by Columbus on the island of Cuba. Sir John 
Hawkins says of its use in Florida : — 

" The Floridians, when they travel, have a kind of herb 
dried, which with a cane and an earthen cup in the end, with 
fire and the dried herbs put together, do suke through the 
cane the smoke thereof, which smoke satisfieth their hunger, 
and therewith they live four or five dayes without meat or 
drinke, and this all the Frenchmen used for this purpose : yet 
do they holde opinion withall, that it causeth water and 
steame to void from their stomacks." 

This preparation might not have been tobacco as the 
Indians smoke a kind of bark which they scrape from the 
killiconick, an aromatic shrub, in form resembling the willow; 



EARLY MAMMOTH CIGAKS. 



39 



they use also a preparation made with this and sumach leaves 
or sometimes with the latter mixed with tobacco. Lionel 
Wafer in his travels npon the Isthmus of Darien in 1699 
saw the plant growing and cultivated by the natives. He 
says : — 

" These Indians have tobacco amongst them. It grows as 
the tobacco in Virginia, but is not so strong, perhaps for 
want of transplanting and manuring, which the Indians do 
not well understand, for they only raise it from the seed in 
their plantations. When it is dried and cured they strip it 
from the stalks, and laying two or three leaves upon one 
another, they roll up all together sideways into a long roll, 
yet leaving a little hollow. Kound this they roll other'leaves 
one after another, in the same manner, but close and hard, 
till the roll be as big as one's wrist, and two or three feet in 
length. Their way of smoking when they are in company 
is thus: a boy lights one end of a roll and burns it to a coal, 
wetting the part next it to keep it from wasting too fast. 
The end so lighted he puts into his mouth, and blows the 
smoke through the whole length of the roll into the face of 
every one of the company or council, though there be two or 
three hundred of them. Then they, sitting in their usual 
posture upon forms, make with their hands held together a 
kind of funnel round their mouths and noses. Into this they 
receive the smoke as it is blown upon them, snuffing it up 
greedily and strongly as long as ever they are able to hold 
their breath, and_ seeming to bless themselves, as it were, with 
the refreshment it gives them." 

In the year 1534 James Cartier a Frenchman was com- 
missioned to explore the coast of North America, with a view 
to find a place for a colony. He observed that the natives 
of Canada used the leaves of an herb which they preserved 
in pouches made of skins and smoked in stone pipes. It 
being offensive to the French, they took none of it with 
theni on their return. But writing more particularly con- 
cerning the plant he says : — 

" In Hochelaga, up the river in Canada there groweth a 
certain kind of herb whereof in Summer they make a great 
provision for all the year, making great account of it, and 
only men use of it, and first they cause it to be dried in the 
Sune, then wear it about their necks wrapped in a little 
beast's skine made 'like a bagge, with a hollow piece of stone 



40 



SACREDNESS OF THE PIPE. 



v^ 




OLD KNG RAVING. 



or wood like a pipe, then when they please they make 
powder of it, and then put it in one of the ends of the said 
Cornet or pipe, and laying a cole of fire upon it, at the other 
end and suck so long, that they fill their bodides full _ of 
smoke, till that it commeth out of their mouth and nostrils, 
even as out of the Tonnel of a chimney. They say that this 
doth keepe them warme and in health, they never goe with- 
out some" of this about them." 

Be Bry in his History of Brazil 1590 gives an engraving 
of a native smoking a pipe and a 
female offering him a handful of 
tobacco leaves. The pipe has a 
modern look and is altogether un- 
like those found by the English in 
use among the Indians in Yirginia. 
An English writer says of the 
Tobacco using races : — 

" From the evidence collected by 
travellers and archaeologists, as to 
the native arts and relics connected with the use of Tobacco 
by the Red Indians, it would appear that not one tribe has 
been found which was unacquainted with the custom,* its 
use being as well known to the tribes of the ISTorth-west and 
the denizens of the snowy wilds of Canada, as to the races 
inhabiting Central America and the West India Islands." 

Father Francisco Creuxio states that the Jesuit mission- 
aries found the weed extensively used by the Indians of the 
Seventeenth Century. In 1629 he found the Hurons smoking 
the dried leaves and stalks of the ToBacco plant or petune. 
Many tribes of Indians consider that Tobacco is a gift 
bestowed by the Great Spirit as a means of enjoyment. In 
consequence of this belief the pipe became sacred, and 
smoking became a moral if not a religious act, amongst the 
North American Indians. The Iroquois are of opinion that 
by burning Tobacco they could send up their prayers to the 
Great Spirit with the ascending incense, thus maintaining 

•Arnold In his History of Rhode Island refers to the planting of tobacco hy the Indiana 
■when the State was tlrst settled. Elliot also says in his History of the same^State :-•' Tobacco 
■was universal, every man carrying his pipe and bag ; and in its cultivation only, did the 
men condescend to labor; but occasionally all would join, the whole neighborhood, men, 
women, and children, when some one's field was to be broken up, and they made a loving, 
sociable, speedy time of it." 4 



EARLY CULTIVATION. 



41 



communication with the spirit worid ; and Dr. Daniel Wilson 
suggests that " the practice of smoking originated in the use 
of the intoxicating fumes for purposes of divination, and 
other superstitious rites." 

When an Indian goes on an expedition, whether of peace 
or war, his pipe is his constant companion ; it is to him what 
salt is among Arabs : the pledge of fidelity and the seal of 
treaties. In the words of a Review : 

" Tobacco supplies one of the few comforts by which men 
who live by their hands, solace themselves under incessant 
hardship." 

While the presence, and use of tobacco by the natives of 
America are among the most interesting features connected 
with its history, it can hardly be more so than is its early 
cultivation by the Spaniards, English and Dutch, and after- 
ward by the French. The cultivation of the plant began in 
the West India Islands and South America early in the Six- 
teenth Century. In Cuba its culture commenced in 1580, and 
from this and the other islands large quantities were shipped 
to Europe. (It was also cultivated near Yarina in Columbia, 
while Amazonian tobacco had acquired an enviable reputation 
as well as Varinian, long before its cultivation began in Vir- 
ginia by the English. At this period of its culture in 
America the entire product was sent to Spain and Portugal, 
and from thence to France and Great Britain and other 
countries of Europe. The plant and its use attracted at 
once the attention as well as aroused the cupidity of the 
Spaniards, who prized it as one of their greatest discoveries. 

As soon as Tobacco was introduced into Europe by the 
Spaniards, and its use became a general custom, its sale 
increased as extensively as its cultivation. At this period it 
brought enormous prices, the finest selling at from fifteen to 
eighteen shillings per pound. Its cultivation by the 
Spaniards in various portions of the New World proved to / 
them not only its real value as an article of commerce, but / 
also that several varieties of the plant existed ; as on / 
removal from one island or province to another it changed in ! 
size and quality bf leaf. Varinas tobacco at this time was; 



42 PROPORTIONS OF THE TOBACCO TRADE. 

one of the finest tobaccos known,* and large quantities 
were shipped to Spain and Portugal. The early voyagers 
little dreamed, however, of the vast proportions to be 
assumed by the trade in the plant which they had dis- 
covered, and which in time proved a source of the greatest 
profit not only to the European colonies, but to the dealers in 
the Old World. 

Helps, treating on this same subject, says : 

" It is interesting to observe the way in which a new pro- 
duct is introduced to the notice of the Old World — a 
product that was hereafter to become, not only an unfailing 
source of pleasure to a large section of the whole part of 
mankind, from the highest to the lowest, but was also 
to distinguish itself as one of those commodities for revenue, 
which are the delight of statesmen, the great financial 
resource of modern nations, and which afford a means 
of indirect taxation that has perhaps nourished many a war, 
and prevented many a revolution. The importance, financi- 
ally and commercially speaking, of this discovery of 
tobacco — a discovery which in the end proved more produc- 
tive to the Spanish crown than that of the gold mines of the 
Indies." 

Spain and Portugal in all their colonies fostered and 
encouraged its cultivation and then at once ranked as 
the best producers and dealers in tobacco. The varieties 
grown by them in the West Indies and South America were 
highly esteemed and commanded much higher prices than 
that grown by the English and Dutch colonies. In 1620, 
however, the Dutch merchants were the largest wholesale 
tobacconists in Europe, and the people of Holland, generally, 
the greatest consumers of the weed. 

The expedition of 1584, under the auspices of Sir Walter 
Haleigh, which resulted in the discovery of Virginia, also 
introduced the tobacco plant, among other novelties, to the 
attention of the English. Hariot,t who sailed with this 
expedition, says of the plant : 

" There is an herb which is sowed apart by itselfe, and is 



•Trinidad totoacco was then considered the finest. 

tA hrief and true Report of the New Found Land of Virginia (London, 1588). 



QUAINT DESCRIPTION. 4.3 

called by the inhabitants nppowoc. In the West Indies it 
hath divers names, according to the severall places and coun- 
tries where it groweth and is used ; the Spaniards generally 
call it Tobacco. The leaves thereof being dried and brought 
into powder, they use to take the fume or smoke thereof by 
sucking it through pipes made of clay into their stomacke 
and heade, from whence it purgeth superfluous fleame and 
other grosse humors ; openeth all the pores and passages of 
the body ; by which means the use thereof not only preserv- 
eth the body from obstructions, but also if any be so that 
they have not beene of too long continuance, in short time 
breaketh them ; whereby their bodies are notably preserved 
in health, and know not many grievous diseases wherewithall 
we in England are oftentimes affected. This uppowoc is of 
so precious estimation araongest them that they thinke their 
gods are marvellously delighted therewith ; whereupon some- 
time they make halowed tires, and cast some of the powder 
therein for a sacrifise. Being in a storme uppon the waters, 
to pacifie their gods, they cast some up into the aire and into 
the water : so a weave for fish being newly set up, they cast 
some therein and into the aire ; also after an escape of danger 
they cast some into the aire likewise ; but all done with 
strange gestures, stamping, sometimes dancing, clapping of 
hands, holding up of hands, and staring up into the heavens, 
uttering there withal and chattering strange wordes, and 
noises. 

"We ourselves during the time we were there used to suck 
it after their manner, as also since our returne, and have 
found many rare and wonderful experiments of the virtues 
thereof; of which the relation would require a volume of 
itselfe ; the use of it by so manie of late, men and women, 
of great calling as else, and some learned phisitions also is 
sufficient witnes." 

The natives also when Drake* landed in Yirerinia, 
" brought a little basket made of rushes, and filled with an 
herbe which they called Tobah;" they "came also the 
second time to us bringing with them as before had been 
done, feathers and bags of Tobah for presents, or rather 
indeed for sacrifices, upon this persuasion that we were 
gods." 

William Stracheyf says of tobacco and its cultivation by 
the Indians : 



*The World Encompassed. London, 1628. 

t" The Historic of Travaile into Virginia Britannica." 



44 



VARIETY OF KINDS. 



" Here is great store of tobacco, which the salvages call 
apooke : howbeit it is not of the best kyiid, it is but poor and 
weake, and of a byting taste; it grows not fully a yard 
a.bove ground, bearing a little yellow flower like to henbane ; 
the leaves are short and thick, some^'hat round at the upper 
end ; whereas the best tobacco of Trynidado and the Oro- 
noque, is large, sharpest and growing two or three yardes 
from the ground, bearing a flower of the breadth of our bell- 
flower, in England ; the salvages here dry the leaves of this 
apooke over the fier, and sometymes in the sun, and crumble 
yt into poudre, stalk, leaves, and all, taking the same in 
pipes of earth, which very ingeniously they can make." 

It would seem then, if the 
account given by Strachey 
be correct, that the tobacco 
cultivated by the Indians 
of North America was of 
inferior growth and quahty 
to that grown in many por- 
tions of South America, and 
more particularly in the 
West India islands. As 
there are still many varie- 
ties of the plant grown in 
America, so there doubtless 
was when cultivated by the Indians. While most probably 
the quality of leaf remained the same from generation to 
generation, still in some portions of America, owing more to 
the soil and climate than the mode of cultivating by them, 
they cured very good tobacco. We can readily see how this 
might have been, from numerous experiments made with 
both American and European varieties. Nearly all of the 
early Spanish, French and English voyagers who landed in 
America were attracted by the beauty of the country. Ponce 
De Leon, who sailed from Spain to the Floridas, was charmed 
by the plants and flowers, and doubtless the first sight of 
them strengthened his belief in the existence somewhere in 
this tropical region of the fountain of youth. 
\ The discovery of tobacco proved of the greatest advantage 

\ 





THE CONTRAST. 



TOBACCO AND COMMERCE. 45 

to the nations wlio fostered its growth, — and increased \ 
the commerce of both England and Spain, doing much to 
make the latter what it once was, one of the most powerful I 
nations of Europe and possessor of the largest and richest ! 
colonies, while it greatly helped the former, already unsur- 
passed in intelligence and civilization, to reach its present 
position at the commercial head of the nations of the world. 

As Spain, however, has fallen from the high place she once 
held, her colonial system has also gone down. And while 
England, thanks to her more liberal policy, still retains a 
large share of the territory which she possessed at first, 
Spain, which once held sway over a vast portion of America, 
has been deprived of nearly all of her colonies, and ere long 
may lose control of the island on which the discoverer of 
America first saw the plant.* 

It is an historical fact that wherever in the English and 
Spanish colonies civilization has taken the deepest root, so 
has also the plant which has become as famous as any of the 
great tropical products of the earth. The relation existing 
between the balmy plant and the commerce of the world is 
of the strongest kind. Fairholt has well said, that "the 
revenue brought to our present Sovereign Lady from this 
source alone is greater than that Queen Elizabeth received 
from the entire customs of the country." 

The narrow view of commercial policy held by her 
Buccessors, the Stuarts, induced them to hamper the colonists 
of America with restrictions ; because they were alarmed 
lest the ground should be entirely devoted to tobacco. Had 
not this Indian plant been discovered, the whole history 
of some portions of America would have been far different. 
In the "West Indies three great products — Coffee, Sugar- 
Cane, and Tobacco, — have proved sources of the greatest 
wealth — and wherever introduced, have developed to a great 
extent the resources of the islands. Thus it may be seen 
that while the Spaniards by the discovery and colonization 

*" Spain has doubtless conqnered more of the Earth's surface than any other modern 
nation ; and her peculiar national character has also caused her to make the worst use of i 
them. It was always easier for the Moor to conquer than to make a good nee of his con- i 
quests ; and bo it has always been with Spain." 



\ 



46 ORIGINAL CULTURE. 

of large portions of America strengthened the currency of 
the world, the English alike, by the cultivation of the plant, 
gave an impetus to commerce still felt and continued 
throughout all parts of the globe. 

An English writer has truthfully observed that " Tobacco 
is like Elias' cloud, which was no bigger than a man's hand, 
that hath suddenly covered the face of the earth ; the low 
countries, Germany, Poland, Arabia, Persia, Turkey, almost 
all countries, drive a trade of it ; and there is no commodity 
that hath advanced so many from small fortunes to gain great 
estates in the world. Sailors will be supplied with it for 
their long voyages. Soldiers cannot (but) want it when 
they keep guard all night, or upon other hard duties in cold 
and tempestuous weather. Farmers, ploughmen, and 
almost all labouring men, plead for it. If we reflect upon 
our forefathers, and that within the time of less than one 
hundred years, before the use of tobacco came to be known 
amongst us, we cannot but wonder how they did to subsist 
without it ; for were the planting or traffick of tobacco now 
hindered, millions of this nation in all probability must 
perish for the want of food, their whole livelihood almost 
depending upon it." 

When first discovered in America, and particularly by 
the English in Virginia, the plant was cultivated only 
by the females of the tribes, the chiefs and warriors 
engaging only in the chase or following the war- 
path. They cultivated a few plants around their wig- 
wams, and cured a few pounds for their own use. The 
smoke, as it ascended from their pipes and circled around 
their rude huts and out into the air, seemed typical of the 
race — the original cultivators and smokers of the plant. 
Put, unlike the great herb which they cherished and gave to 
civilization, they have gradually grown weak in numbers and 
faded away, while the great plant has gone on its way, ever 
assuming more and more sway over the commercial and 
social world, until it now takes high rank among the leading 
elements of mercantile and agricultural greatness. 



CHAPTER III. 



TOBACCO IN AMEEICA. 




^E do not find in any accounts of the English 
voyagers made previous to 1584, any mention of the 
discovery of tobacco, or its use among the Indians. 
This may appear a little strange, as Captains Amidas 
and Barlow, who sailed from England under the auspices of 
Sir "Walter Raleigh in 1584, on returning from Virginia, had 
brought home with them pearls and tobacco among other 
curiosities. But while we have no account of those who 
returned from the voyage made in 1602 taking any tobacco 
with them, it is altogether probable that those who remained 
took a lively interest in the plant and the Indian mode of 
use; for we find that in nine years after they landed at 
Jamestown tobacco had become quite an article of culture 
and commerce. 

Hamo in alluding to the early cultivation of tobacco by 
the colony, says, that John Rolfe was the pioneer tobacco 
planter. In his words : 

" I may not forget the gentleman worthie of much com- 
mendations, which first took the pains to make triall thereof, 
his name Mr. John Rolfe, Anno Domini 1612, partly for the 
love he hath a long time borne unto it, and partly to raise 
commodities to the adventurers, in whose behalfe I intercede 
and vouchsafe to hold my testimony in beleefe that during 
the time of his aboade there, which draweth neere sixe years 



48 



FIRST GENERAL PLANTING. 



no man laath labonred to his power there, and worthy incour- 
agement unto England, by his letters than he hath done, 




JOHN ROLFK. 



witness his marriage with Powhatan's daughter one of rude 
education, manners barbarous, and cursed generation merely 
for the good and honor of the plantation." 

The first general planting of tobacco by the colony began 
according to this writer — "at "West and Sherley Hundred 
(seated on the north side of the river, lower than the Ber- 
mudas three or four myles) where are twenty -five commanded 
by capten Maddeson — who are imployed onely in planting 
and curing tobacco." 

This was in 1616, when the colony numbered only three 
hundred and fifty-one persons. Rolfe, in his relation of the 
state of Yirginia, written and addressed to the King, gives 
the following description of the condition of the colony in 
1616: 



STATE OF THE COLONY. 49 

"Now that joxir highness may with the more ease under- 
stand in what condition the colony standeth, I have briefly 
sett downe the manner of all men's several imployments, the 
number of them, and the several places of their aboad, which 
places or seates are all our owne ground, not so mnch by 
conquest, which the Indians hold a just and lawfull title, but 
purchased of them freely, and they verie willingly selling it. 
The places which are now possessed and inhabited are sixe : — 
Henrico and the lymitts, Bermuda Nether hundred, "West 
and Sherley hundred, James Towne, Kequoughtan, and 
Dales-Gift. The generall mayne body of the planters are 
divided into Officers, Laborers, Farmors. 

" The officers have the charge and care as well over the 
farmors as laborers generallie — that they watch and ward for 
their preservacions ; and that both the one and the other's 
busines may be daily followed to the performance of those 
imployments, which from the one are required, and the other 
by covenant are bound unto. These officers are bound to 
maintayne themselves and families with food and rayment 
by their owne and their servant's Industrie. The laborers 
are of two sorts. Some employed onely in the generall 
works, who are fedd and clothed out of the store — others, 
specially artificers as smiths, carpenters, shoemakers, taylors, 
tanners, &c., doe worke in their professions for the colony, 
and maintayne themselves with food ann apparrell, liaving 
time lymitted them to till and manure their ground. 

" The farmors live at most ease — yet by their good endeav- 
ors bring yearlie much plentie to the plantation. They are 
bound by covenant, both for themselves and servants, to 
maintaine your Ma'ties right and title in that kingdom, 
against all foreigne and domestique enemies. To watch and 
ward in the townes where they are resident. To do thirty- 
one dayes service for the colony, when they shalbe called 
thereunto — yet not at all tymes, but when their owne busines 
can best spare them. To maintayne themselves and families 
with food and rayment — and every farmor to pay yearlie 
into the magazine for himself and every man servant, two 
barrells and a halfe of English measure. 

" Thus briefly have I sett downe every man's particular 
imployment and manner of living ; albeit, lest the people — 
who generallie are bent to covett after gaine, especially hav- 
ing tasted of the sweete of their labors — should spend too 
much of their tyme and labor in planting tobacco, known to 
them to be verie vendible in England, and so neglect their 
tillage of corne, and fall into want thereof, it is provided for 
4 



50 CONDITIONS OF RAISING TOBACCO. 

— by the providence and care of Sir Thomas Dale — that no 
farmor or other, wlio must maintayne themselves — shall plant 
any tobacco, unless he shall yearely manure, set and main- 
tayne for himself and every man servant tveo acres of ground 
with corne, which doing they may plant as much tobacco as 
they will, els all their tobacco shalbe forfeite to the colony — 
by which meanes the magazine shall yearely be sure to 
receave their rent of corne ; to maintayne those who are fedd 
thereout, being but a few, and manie others, if need be ; they 
themselves will be well stored to keepe their families with 
overplus, and reape tobacco enough to buy clothes and such 
other necessaries as are needfal for themselves and household. 
For an easie laborer will keepe and tend two acres of corne, 
and cure a good store of tobacco — being yet the principal! 
commoditie the colony for the present yieldeth. 

" For which as for other commodities, the councell and 
company for Virginia have already sent a ship thither, fur- 
nished with all manner of clothing, household stuff and such 
necessaries, to establish a magazine there, which the people 
shall buy at easie rates for their commodities — they selling 
them at such prices that the adventurers may be no loosers. 
This magazine shalbe yearelie supplied to furnish them, if 
they will endeavor, by their labor, to maintayne it — which 
wilbe much beneficiall to the planters and adventurers, by 
interchanging their commodities, and will add much encour- 
agement to them and others to preserve and follow the action 
with a constant resolution to uphold the same." 

The colony at this time was engaged in planting corn and 
tobacco, " making pitch and tarr, potashes, charcole, salt," 
and in fishing. Of Jamestown he says : 

" At James Tonne (seated on the north side of the river, 
from West and Sherley Hundred lower down about thirty- 
seven miles) are fifty, under the command of lieutenant 
Sharpe, in the absence of capten Francis West, Esq., brother 
to the right ho'ble the L. Lawarre, — whereof thirty-one are 
farmors; all theis maintayne themselves with food and ray- 
ment. Mr. Eichard Buck minister there — a verie good 
preacher." 

Rev. Hugh Jones " Chaplain to the Honourable Assembly, 
and lately Minister of James-Towne and in Virginia," in a 
work entitled — " The Present State of Virginia," gives the 
following account of the cultivation of tobacco : 

" When a tract of land is seated, they clear it by felling 



TOBACCO FIELDS, 1620. 



51 



the trees about a yard from the ground, lest they should 
shoot again. "What wood they have occasion for they carry 
off, and burn the rest, or let it lie and rot upon the ground. 
The land between the logs and stumps they hoe up, planting 




VIRGINIA TOBACCO FIELD, 1620. 

tobacco there in the spring, inclosing it with a slight fence of 
cleft rails. This will last for tobacco some years, if the land 
be good ; as it is where fine timber, or grape vines grow. 
Land when hired is forced to bear tobacco by penning their 
cattle upon it ; but cowpen tobacco tastes strong, and that 
planted in wet marshy land is called nonburning tobacco, 
which smoaks in the pipe like leather, unless it be of a good 
age. When land is tired of tobacco, it will bear Indian Corn 
or English "Wheat, or any other European grain or seed with 
wonderful increase. 

" Tobacco and Indian Corne are planted in hills as hops, 
and secured by worm fences, which are made of rails sup- 
porting one another very firmly in a particular manner. 
Tobacco requires a great deal of skill and trouble in the right 
management of it. They raise the plants in beds, as we do 
Cabbage plants; which they transplant and replant upon 
occasion after a shower of rain, which they call a season. 
"When it is grown up they top it, or nip off the head, succour 



52 INCREASE OF TOBACCO GROWING. 

it, or cut off the ground leaves, weed it, hill it ; and when 
ripe, they cut it down about six or eight leaves on a stalk, 
which they carry into airy tobacco houses, after it is withered 
a little in the sun, there it is hung to dry on sticks, as paper 
at the paper-mills ; when it is in proper case, (as they call it) 
and the air neither too moist, nor too dry, they strike it, or 
take it down, then cover it up in bulk, or a great heap, where 
it lies till they have leisure or occasion to strip it (that is pull 
the leaves from the stalk) or stem it (that is to take out the 
great fibres) and tie it up in hands, or streight lay it ; and so 
by degrees prize or press it with proper engines into great 
Hogsheads, containing from about six to eleven hundred 
pounds ; four of which Hogsheads make a tun by dimention, 
not by weight ; then it is ready for sale or shipping. 

There are two sorts of tobacco, viz., Oroonoko the stronger, 
and sweet-scented the milder; the first with a sharper leaf 
like a Fox's ear, and the other rounder and with finer fibres : 
But each of these are varied into several sorts, much as 
Apples and Pears are; and I have been informed by the 
Indian traders, that the Inland Indians have sorts of tobacco 
much differing from any planted or used by the Europeans. 
The Indian Corn is planted in hills and weeded much as 
tobacco. This grain is of great increase and most general 
use ; for with this is made good bread, cakes, mush, and 
hommony for the negroes, which with good pork and potatoes 
(red and white, very nice and different from ours) with other 
roots and pulse, are their general food." 

The cultivation of tobacco increased with the growth of 
the colony and the increase of price which at this time was 
sufficient to induce most of the planters to neglect the cul- 
ture of Corn and Wheat, devoting their time to growing 
their "darling tobacco." The first thirty years after the 
colonization of Yirginia by the English, the colony made but 
little progress owing in part to private factions and Indian 
wars. The horrid massacres by the Indians threatened the 
extermination of the colony, and for a time the plantations 
were neglected and even tobacco became more of an article 
of import than of export, which is substantiated by an early 
writer of the colony who says: — "A vast quantity of 
tobacco is consumed in the country in smoking, chewing, and 
snuff." Frequent complaints were made by the colony of 
want of strength and danger of imminent famine, owing in 



RESTRICTIONS ON TOBACCO-RAISING. 53 

part to the presence of a greater number of adventurers than 
of actual settlers, — sucli being the case the resources of the 
country were in a measure limited. 

The demand for tobacco in England increasing each year, 
together with the high price paid for that from Virginia (3 
6. per lb.), stimulated the planters to hazard all their time 
and labor upon one crop, neglecting the cultivation of the 
smaller grains, intent only upon curing "a good store of 
tobacco." The company of adventurers at length found it 
necessary to check the excessive planting of the weed, and 
by the consent of the " Generall Assemblie " restraining the 
plantations to " one hundred plants* ye headd, uppon each 
of wich plantes there are to bee left butt onely nyne leaves 
wch portions as neare as could be guessed, was generally 
conceaved would be agreable with the hundred waight you 
have allowed." 

In 1639 the " Grand Assembly " (summoned the sixth of 
January) passed a law restricting the growth of the colony 
to 1,500,000 lbs., and to 1,200,000 in the two years next 
ensuing. The exporting of the poorer qualities of tobacco 
by the colony caused much dissatisfaction as will be seen by 
a letter of the Company dated 11th September, 1621 : 

" "We are assured from our Factor in Holland that except 
the tobacco that shall next come thence prove to be of more 
perfection and goodnesse than that was sent home last, there 
is no hope that it vend att all, for albeit itt passed once yett 
the wary buyer will not be againe taken, so that we heartily 
"wish that youe would make some provision for the burninge 
of all base and rotten stuff, and not suffer any but very good 
to be cured at least sent home, whereby these would certainly 
be more advanced in the price upon lesse in the quantity; 
howsoever we hope that no bad nor ill conditioned tobacco 
shall be by compelling authoritie (abusing its power given 
for public good to private benefit) putt uppon or Factor, and 
very earnestly desire that he may have the helpe of justice 
to constraine men to pay their debts unto him both remain- 
ing of the last yeares accompt and what shall this yearse 
growth deue, and that in Comodities of the same vallew and 
goodness as shalbe by him contracted for." 

•Another account Is sixty pounds per head. 



54: TOBACCO USED AS MONEY. 

At this period it appears that tobacco was used as money, 
and as the measure of price and value. The taxes whether 
public, county, or parish, were payable in tobacco. 

Tatham says, " Even the tavern keepers were compelled to 
exchange a dinner for a few pounds of tobacco." The law 
for the regulation of payments in tobacco was passed in the 
year 1640. From these facts and incidents connected with 
the culture and commerce of the plant we see how intimately 
it was connected with both Church and State. Jones well 
said " the Establishment is indeed tobacco ;" the salary of 
ministers was payable in it according to the wealth of the 
parish. In most parishes 16000 lbs. was the yearly amount, 
"and in some 20,000 lbs. of Tobacco ; out of which there is a 
deduction for Cask, prizing, collecting, and about which 
allowance there are sometimes disputes, as are also differences 
often about the place, time, and manner of delivering it ; but 
all these things might easily be regulated. Tobacco is more 
commonly at 20 s. per cent, than at 10 ; so that certainly it 
will bring 12 s. 8 d. a hundred, which will make 16000 (the 
least salary) amount to 100£ per Ann. which it must cer- 
tainly clear, allowing for all petty charges, out of the lowness 
of the price stated which is less than the medium between 
ten and twenty shillings ; whereas it might be stated above 
the medium, since it is often er at twenty than ten shillings. 
Besides the payment of the salary, the surplice fees want a 
better regulation in the payments ; for though the allowance 
be sufficient, yet differences often and illwill arise about these 
fees, whether they are to be paid in money or tobacco, and 
when ; whereas by a small alteration and addition of a few 
laws in these and the like respects, the clergy might live 
more happj^, peaceable, and better beloved ; and the people 
would be more easy, and pay never the more dues. 

" Some parts of the country make but mean and poor 
tobacco so that Clergymen don't care to live in such parishes; 
but there the payment might be made in money, or in the 
produce of those places, which might be equivalent to the 
tobacco payments ; better for the minister, and as pleasing to 
the people." 

We find further complaints from the London Company of 
the poor quality of the tobacco " sent home," in a letter 
addressed to the Governor, bearing date 10th June, 1622 : — 

" The tobacco sent home by the George for the company 



BUYING WIVES WITH TOBACCO. 55 

proved very meane and is yett unsold although it hath been 
ofi'ered at 3s. the pound. This we thought iitt to advise you 
concerning the quantity and the manner how it is raised, in 
both wich being done contrarie to their directors and 
extreamly to theire prejudice, the Companie is very ill sattis- 
fied, will write by the next, more largely." 

In the year 1620 the difficulties seem first to have been 
publicly avowed, (though perhaps before felt,) arising from 
attaching men as permanent settlers to the colony without 
an adequate supply of women, to furnish the comforts of 
domestic life; and to overcome the difficulty "a hundred 
young women " of agreeable persons and respectable char- 
acters, were selected in England and sent out, at the expense 
of the Company, as wives for the settlers. They were very 
speedily appropriated by the young men of the colony, who 
paid for the privilege of choice considerable sums as purchase 
money, which went to replenish the treasury of the Company, 
from whence the cost of their outfit and passage had been 
defrayed. 

This speculation proved so advantageous to that body, in 
a pecuniary sense, that it was soon followed up by sending 
out sixty more, for whom larger prices were paid than for 
the first consignment ; the amount paid on the average for 
the first one hundred being 120 pounds of tobacco apiece for 
each, then valued at 3s. per lb., and for the second supply of 
sixty, the average price paid was 150 lbs. of tobacco, this being 
the legal currency of the colony, and the standard value by 
which all contracts, salaries, and prices were paid. In one of 
the Companies letters dated in London this 12th of August, 
1621, we find this account of a portion of the goods sent over 
in the ship Marmaduke : — 

"We send you in this ship one widdow and eleven maids 
for wives for the people in Virginia ; there hath been especiall 
care had in the choise of them for their hath not any one of 
them beene received but upon good comendations, as by a 
note herewith sent you may perceive : we pray you all there- 
fore in generall to take them into your care, and most espe- 
cially we recommend them to you, Mr. Pountes, that at their 
first landing they may be housed, lodged and provided for of 
diet till they be marryed for such was the haste of sending 



56 CARGOES OF WOMEN. 

them away, as that straightned with time, we had no meanes 
to putt provisions aboard, which defect shalbe supplied by 
the magazine shipp ; and in case they cannot be presently 
marryed we desire they may be putt to several householders 
that have wives till they can be provided of husbands. There 
are neare fifty more which are shortly to come, w^e sent by 
our most honoble Lord William the Earle of Southampton 
and certain worthy gentlemen who taking into these consid- 
erations, that the Plantation can never nourish till families 
be planted and the respect of wives and children fix the 
people in the soil ; therefore have given this fair beginning 
for the reimbursing of whose charges, itt is ordered that every 
man that marries them give 120 lb. waight of best leafe 
tobacco for each of them, and in case any of them dye that 
proportion must be advanced to make it upp to those that 
survive ; and this certainly is sett down for that the price 
sett upon the bages sent last jeare being 20 lb. which was so 
much money out of purse here, there was returned 66 lb. of 
tobacco onl}'', and that of the worst and basest, so that fraight 
and shrinkage reconed together with the baseness of the 
comoditie there was not one half returned, which injury the 
company is sensible of as they demand restitution, which 
accordingly nmst be had of them that took uppon them the 
dispose of them the rather that no man may mistake himself, 
in accomptinge tobacco to be currant 3s. sterling contrary to 
express orders. 

"And though we are desirous that marriadge be free accord- 
ing to the law of nature, yett undervow not to have these 
maids deterred and married to servants, but only to such 
freemen or tenants as have means to maintaine them ; we 
pray you therefore to be fathers to them in this business, not 
enforcing them to marrie against their wills ; neither send 
we them to be servants, but in case of extremitie, for we 
would have their condition so much better as multitudes may 
be allured thereby to come unto you ; and you may assure 
such men as marry those women that the first servants sent 
over by the company shall be consigned to them, it being 
our intent to preserve families and proper married men before 
single persons. The tobacco that shall be due uppon the 
marriadge of these maids we desire Mr. Pountes to receive 
and returne by the first, as also the little quantities of Pitzarn 
Rock and Piece of Oare, the copie of whose bill is here 
returned. To conclude, the company for some weighty reasons 
too long to relate, have ordered that no man marrying these 



VALUABLE CONSIGNMENTS. 



57 



women expect the proportion of land usnally allotted for 
each head, which to avoid clamor or other trouble hereafter 
you shall do well to give them notice of." 

In another letter written by the company and dated Lon- 
don, September 11th, 1621, they write: — 
' ' "By this Shipp and Pinace called the Tyger, we also send 
as many maids and young women as will make up the num- 
ber of fifty, with those twelve formerly sent in the Marma- 
duke, which we hope shalbe received with the same Christian 
pietie and charitie as they were sent from hence ; 'the pro- 
viding for them at their first landing and disposing'of them 
in marriage (which is our chief intent), we leave to your care 




BUYING WIVES. 



and wisdom, to take that order as may most conduce to their 
good, and satisfaction of the Adventurers, for the charges 
disbursed in setting them forth, which coming to twelve 
pounds and upwards, they require one hundred and fiftie of 
the best leafo tobacco for each of them ; and if any of them 
dye there must bo a proportionable addition uppon the rest ; 
this increase of thirty pounds is weight since those sent in 



58 EXCELLENT INSTRUCTIONS. 

the Marmaduke, they have resolved to make, finding the 
great shrinkage and other losses nppon the tobacco from Vir- 
ginia will not leave lesse, which tobacco as it shalbe received, 
we desire may be delivered to Mr. Ed. Blany, who is to keep 
thereof a particular account. We have used extraordinary 
care and dilligence in the choice of them, and have received 
none of whom we have not had good testiraon}'- of their honest 
life and cariadge, which together with their names, we send 
them inclosed for the satisfaction of such as shall marry 
them ; for whose further encouragement we desire you to 
give public notice that the next spring we purpose to send 
over as many youths for apprentices to those that shall now 
marry any of them and make us due satisfaction. 

"This and theire owne good deserts together with your favor 
and care^ will we hope, marry them all unto honest and suffi- 
cient men, whose means will reach to present repayment ; 
but if any of them shall unwarily or fondly bestow herself 
(for the liberty of raarriadge we dare not infrindge) uppon such 
as shall not be able to give present sattisfaction, we desire that 
at least ag soon as ability shalbe, they be compelled to pay 
the true quantity of tobacco proportioned, and that this debt 
may have precedence of all other to be recovered. 

" For the rest, which we hope will not be many, we desire 
your best furtherance for providing them fitting services till 
they may happen uppon good matches, and are here per- 
suaded by many old planters that there will be good maisters 
now found there, who will readily lay down what charges 
shall be required, uppon assurance of repayment at their 
marriadges, which as just and reasonable we desire may be 
given them. But this and many other things in this busi- 
ness we must refer to your good considerations and fruitful 
endeavors in opening a work begun here out of pity, and 
tending so much to the benefitt of the plantation, shall not 
miscarry for any want of good will or care on your part." 

In 1622 a monopoly of the importation of tobacco was 
granted to the Virginia and Somcrs Island companies. 

" But now at last it hath pleased God for the confirmation 
no doubt of our hopes and redoubling of our and your cour- 
age, to incline His Majestie's Royall heart to grant the sole 
importation of Tobacco (a thing long and earnestly desired), to 
the Virginia and Somers Island Companies, and that upon such 
conditions as the private profit of each man is likely to be 
much improved and the general state of the plantation 
strongly secured, while his Majestie's revenue is so closely 



KING JAMES OPPOSES TOBACCO-RAISLNQ. 59 

joyned as together with the colonie it must rise and faile, 
grow and impair, and that not a small matter neither, but of 
twenty thousand pounds per annum, (for the offer of so much 
in certainty hath his majestie been pleased to refuse in favor 
of the Plantations." 

On Friday the 22d of March 1622 the Indians attacked the 
plantations " and attempted in most places under the color 
of unsuspected amytie, and by surprise to have cut us all off 
and to have swept us all away at once throughout the whole 
lande had itt not pleased God of his abundant mercy to 
prevent them in many places, for which we can never suffi- 
cient magnihe his blessed name." 

But notwithstanding this terrible massacre in which nearly 
four hundred persons were slain the colony increased in 
wealth and numbers as plantations were laid out and the 
colonists developed the various resources of the country. 
"Trom the first planting of tobacco in Virginia by the colony 
it seemed to meet the royal displeasure of King James the 
First who falsely and frivolously sought to establish a 
connection between the balmy plant, and the influences of the 
Evil One. 

In 1622 King James still opposing the cultivation of 
tobacco sought by every means in his power to discourage 
its growth and culture. He urged the growing of mulberry 
trees and the propagation of silk worms, as being of more 
value than tobacco. In a letter dated 10th June 1622, 
addressed to the Governor and Council of Virginia by the 
London Company we find this reproof for neglecting the 
cultivation of " mulberrie trees " : 

" His Ma"^ (Majesty) above all things requires from us a 
proof of silke ; sharply reproving the neglect thereof, where- 
fore we pray you lett that little stock you have be carefully 
improved, the mulberrie trees preserved and increased, and 
all other fitt preparations made for, God willing before 
Christmas you shall receive from us one hundred ounces of 
Silkworme seed at least, which coming too late from Valen- 
tia we have been forced to hatch it here." 

In 1623 a letter was prepared for the colony by order of 
privy council of the king and addressed to Sir Francis 
Wyatt Knight and Captain General of Virginia and to the 



60 THE COLONIES ADMONISHED. 

rest ol the Council of State in which the colony is admon- 
ished to pay more attention to " Staple Commodities." That 
part relating to it reads : 

"The carefull and diligent prosecution of Staple Commo- 
dities which we promist ; we above all things pray you to 
performe so as we may have speedily the real proof of your 
cares and endeavors therein, especially in that of Iron, of 
Vines and Silk the neglect and delay whereof so long is to us 
here cause of infinit grief and discontent, especially in 
regard of his Majesties just resentment therein that his Royall 
grace and love to the Plantation, which after so long a time 
and long a supply of his Majesties favor hath brought forth 
no better fruit than Tobacco. 

"Yett by the goodness of God inclyninghis princely heart, 
Ave have received not only from the Lords of his Privy 
Counsell, but from his Royal mouth such assurance not only 
of his tender love and care but also of his Royal intentions 
for the advancement of the Plantation ; that we cannot 
but exceedingly rejoice therein and persuade you with much 
more comfort and encouragement to go on in the building up 
of his Royal worke with all sincerity, care and diligence, and 
that with that perfect love and union amongst yourselves as 
may really demonstrate that your intentions are all one, the 
advancement of God's glorie and the service of his Royall 
Majestic: for the particularities of his Majesties gratious 
intentions for the future good, you may in part understand 
them by the courses appointed by the Lords, whereof we 
here inclosed send the orders. 

"And we are further to signifie unto you that the Lords 
of his Majesties Privy Counsell, having by his Majesties order 
taken into their considerations the contract made last Som- 
mer by the Company have dissolved the same ; and signified 
that his Majestic out of his gracious and Royall intention 
and princely favor to the Plantation hath resolved to grant a 
sole Importion of Tobacco to the two Plantations, with an 
exception only of 40,000 weight of ye best Spanish Tobacco 
to be yearly brought in. 

" And it hath also pleased his Majesty in favor of the 
Plantation to reduce ye custom and importing of tobacco to 
9(1. per pound : And last of all we are to signifie unto you 
that their Lordships have ordered that all the Tobacco shall 
be brought in from both Plantations as by their Lordship 
order whereof we send you a copy, you may perceive." 



FOREIGN TOBACCO PROHIBITED. Ql 

In 1624 King James prohibited the importation of foreign 
tobacco as well as the planting of tobacco in England or 
Ireland. The following is a portion of the proclamation : — 

"Whereas our commons, in their last sessions of parlia- 
ment became humble petitioners to us, that, for many weighty 
reasons, much concerning the interest of our kingdom, and 
the trade thereof, we would by our royal power utterly pro- 
hibit the use of all foreign tobacco, which is not of the growth 
of our own dominions : And whereas we have upon all occa- 
sions made known our dislike we have ever had of the use of 
tobacco in general, as tending to the corruption both of the 
health and manners of our people. 

" Nevertheless because we have been often and earnestly 
importuned by many of our loving subjects, planters, and 
adventurers in Virginia and the Somer isles ; that, as those 
colonies are yet but in their infancy, and cannot be brought 
to maturity, unless we be pleased, for a time, to tolerate unto 
them the planting and vending of their own growth ; we 
have condescended to their desires: and do therefore hereby 
strictly prohibit the importation of any tobacco from beyond 
sea, or from Scotland, into England or Ireland other than 
from our colonies before named ; moreover we strictly pro- 
hibit the planting of any tobacco either in England or 
Ireland." 

Thus King James by Proclamation and Prohibition set his 
face sternly against the growth and traffic in the plant, which 
opposition knew no alteration and continued till his death, 
which occurred in 1625. James was succeeded by his son 
Charles I. On ascending the throne Charles manifested the 
same hostility towards the plant which his father had. He 
prohibited the importation of all tobacco excepting that 
grown by the colony, and throughout his reign made na 
change in the restrictive laws against its growth and sale. 
He continued its sale, however, as a kingly monopoly, allow- 
ing only those to engage in it who paid him for the privilege. 
The Company had now raised a capital of two hundred 
thousand pounds, but falling into dispute and disagreeing 
one with another, Charles thought best to establish a royal 
government. 

Accordingly he dissolved the Company in 1626, "reduc- 
ing the Country and Government into his own immediate 



(52 KING CHARLES ON TOBACCO. 

ordering all patents and processes to issue in his own name, 
reserving to himself a quit-rent of two shillings for everj 
hundred acres of land." 

The first act was by proclamation as follows : — 

" That whereas, in his royal father's time, the charter of 
the Virginia Company was by a quo warranto annulled ; and 
whereas his said father was, and he himself also is, of opinion, 
that the government of that Colony by a company incorpo- 
rated, consisting of a multitude of persons of various dispo- 
sitions, amongst whom affairs of the greatest moment are 
ruled by a majority of votes, was not so proper, for carrying 
on, prosperously, the affairs of the colony ; wherefore, to 
reduce the government thereof to such a course as might 
best agree with that form which was held in his royal mon- 
archy ; and considering also, that we hold those territories of 
Virginia and Somer isles, as also that of New England, lately 
planted, with the limits thereof, to be a part of our royal 
empire; we ordain that the government of Virginia shall 
immediately depend on ourself, and not be committed to any 
company or corporation, to whom it may be proper to trust 
matters of trade and commerce, but cannot be fit to commit 
the ordering of state affairs. 

" Wherefore our commissioners for those affairs shall pro- 
ceed as directed, till we establish a council here for that 
colony ; to be subordinate to out council here for that colony. 
And at our charge we will maintain those public officers and 
ministers and that strength of men, munition, and fortifica- 
tion, which shall be necessary for the defence of that planta- 
tion. And we will also settle and assure the particular rights 
and interests of every planter and adventurer. Lastly, 
whereas the tobacco of those plantations (the only present 
means of their subsisting) cannot be managed for the good 
of the plantations, unless it be brought into one hand, whereby 
the foreign tobacco of those plantations may yield a certain 
and ready price to the owners thereof : to avoid all differences 
between the planters and adventurers themselves, we resolve 
to take the same into our own hands, and to give such prices 
for the same as may give reasonable satisfaction, whereof we 
will determine at better leisure." 

From this time forward the Plantation seemed to prosper, 
Charles granted lands to all the planters and adventurers 
who would till them, upon paying the annual sum of two 
shillings payable to the crown for each hundred acres. 



KING CHARLES AS A TOBACCO MERCHANT. 53 

direction, appointing the Governor and Council himself, and 
Before the death of King James, however, the cultivation 
of tobacco had become so extensive that every other product 
seemed of but little value in comparison with it, and the 
price realized from its sale being so much greater than that 
obtained for " Corne," the latter was neglected and its culture 
almost entirely abandoned. 

Arthur and Carpenter, in their History of Virginia, give 
a graphic and truthful picture of its cultivation during the 
reign of King James : — 

" The first articles of commerce to the production of which 
the early settlers almost exclusively devoted themselves, were 
potash, soap, glass and tar. Distance, however, and a want 
of the proper facilities to enable them to manufacture cheaply, 
rendered the cost of these commodities so great, that exports 
of a similar character from Russia and Sweden were still 
enabled to maintain their old ascendency in the markets of 
Europe. After many fruitless and costly experiments in the 
cultivation of the vine, the growing demand for tobacco 
enabled the planters to turn their labor into a profitable 
channel. As the demand increased the profits became corre- 
spondingly great, and every other species of labor was aban- 
doned for the cultivation of tobacco. 

" The houses were neglected, the palisades suffered to rot 
down, the fields, gardens and public squares, even the very 
streets of Jamestown were planted with tobacco. The towns- 
'^ people, more greedy of gain than mindful of their own 
^ security, scattered abroad into the wilderness, where they 
^ broke up small pieces of rich ground and made their crop 
^ regardless of their proximity to the Indians, in whose good 
faith so little reliance could be placed." 

During the reign of Charles I. many families of respect- 
able connection joined the colony, and from this time 
forward the colony increased in wealth as well as numbers. 
King Charles, to use the language of another, had now com- 
menced " as a tobacco merchant and monopolist," and in 1627 
issued a proclamation renewing his already strong monopoly 
more effectually, by appointing certain officers of London 
"to seize all foreign tobacco, not of the growth of Virginia 
or Bermudas, for his benefit, agreeable to a former commis- 
sion : also to buy up for his use all the tobacco coming from 



64 



TOBACCO TAXED. 



our said plantations, and to sell the same again for his benefit." 
Again in 1630 King Charles issued another proclamation, 







GROWING TOBICCO IN THE STREETS. 



and among other restrictions limited the importation of it 
from the colony. Quickly following this the King issued in 
1632 another proclamation regulating the retailing of tobacco. 
In 1634 he also prohibited the landing of tobacco any where 
except at the quay near the custom house in London. 

In 1636 Charles appoined Sir John Harvey to be continued 
governor of the Plantation. In 1643 parliament laid a tax 
for the year 1644, calling it Excise, and also laid a duty of 
four shillings per pound on foreign, and two shillings per 
pound on English tobacco. From what has already been 
written, it will be seen that both King James and his son 



PLANTING IN MARYLAND. 65 

Charles I. enacted the most stringent laws against its import- 
ation, nearly suppressing the trade, which caused the 
English farmers to cultivate it for home use ; but another 
law was now added to suppress its growth on English soil. 

Fairholt in speaking of the hostility of King James to the 
plant says: 

" Wlicn Kings make unnecessary and unjust laws, subjects 
naturally study how to evade them : it is a mere system of 
self-defence; and as James nearly suppressed the importation 
of tobacco the English began to grow it on their own land. 
But the Scottish Solomon who was on the alert, added 
another law , restraining its cultivation 'to misuse and mis- 
employ the soil of this fruitful Kingdom.' As this enforced the 
trade with the English colony of Virginia alone, it was soon 
found that Spanish and Portuguese tobacco might be brought 
into port on the payment of the old duty of twopence a 
pound ; thus a large trade was carried on with their planters 
to the injury of the British colonists. 

" Its use increased in spite of all legislative laws and 
enactments and James ended by prohibiting any person from 
dealing in the article who did not hold his letters patent. 
By this means the trade was monopolized, the consumers 
oppressed, importation diminished, and the London Company 
of Virginia traders ultimately ruined. Those who are fond 
of excusing the evil acts of one of the worst of English 
Kings, pretend to see James' care for his subjects' health and 
wealth in these restrictions, totally regardless of the fact 
that James cared for neither when the monopoly brought 
large sums into his own pocket." 

In 1632 Charles I. granted to Sir George Calvert (who 
about this time was made Lord Baltimore) the territory now 
known as Maryland ; soon after receiving the grant he died, 
when his son took the grant in his own name. The next 
year he sailed from England with two hundred persons and 
settled in his new possessions. The colony from the first, 
prospered far better than the colony of Virginia and soon 
laid the foundation of a strong and substantial government. 
Like the Virginians they soon engaged in the cultivation of 
tobacco which seemed as well adapted to the soil as the 
other products, corn and English wheat. The Indians were 
found here as in the Plantation of Virginia planting tobacco 
5 



66 



NEGRO LABOR. 



as they did Indian corn and cultivating little patches of it 
near their wigwams choosing tlie most fertile soil the 
females of the tribe being the actual cultivators. 

From this time forward both colonies developed into 



-s^r-, . 'r>/^H 




NATIVES GROWING TOBACCO. 



strong and flourishing plantations and with each succeeding 
year increased the cultivation of tobacco which had now 
become more extensively cultivated than all the other pro- 
ducts combined. Its culture however was looked upon 
"with the same disapproval by Charles II. who confirmed the 
old laws against its sale and cultivation. But notwithstand- 
ing the remonstrances of the Stuarts the plant grew in use 
and favor and could not be uprooted even by a kingly hand. 
The early cultivators of the plant received a fresh impetus 
from the importation of a new species of labor in the form 
of Negro slaves brought from the West India islands. They 



IMPORTATION OF NEGROES. 67 

arrived in the Sbip Treasurer " being manned by the best 
men of the colony who set out on roving in ye Spanish 
dominions in the West Indies " and after a successful cruise 
against the Spaniards returned witli their spoils including a 
certain number of l!^egroes. Holfe in alluding to the impor- 
tation of ISTegroes says : 

" About the last of August came in, a Dutch man-of-\varre 
that sold us twenty negars." 

Most writers are of the opinion that this was in 1620, one 
of whom says "in the same year that the Pilgrims landed at 
Plymouth, slaves landed in Virginia." Another writer says 
of the introduction of slave labor into the Plantations, "Is 
there not a probability that the vessel was under control of 
Argall, if not the ship Treasurer ? If twenty negroes came 
in 1619, as alleged, their increase was very slow, for accord- 
ing to a census of 16th of February, 1624, there were but 
twenty-two then in the colony, distributed as follows: eleven 
at Flourdiew Hundred, three at James City, one at James 
Island, one at the plantation opposite James City, four at 
Warisquoyok, and two at Elizabeth City." 

About the same time that " negars " landed in the colony, 
commenced the arrival of starving boys and girls picked up 
out of the streets of London. The "negars" are described 
as follows by an early writer of the colony. " The negroes 
live in small cottages called quarters, in about six in a gang, 
under the direction or an overseer or baliff ; who takes care 
that they tend such land as the owner allots and orders, upon 
which they raise Hogs and Cattle, plant Indian Corn (or 
maize) and Tobacco for the use of their Master ; out of which 
the overseer has a dividend (or share) in proportion to the 
number of hands including himself ; this with several privi- 
leges in his salary, and is an ample recompense for his 
})ains, and encouragement of his industrious care, as to the 
abor, health, and provision of the negroes. The negroes are 
very numerous, some gentlemen having hundreds of them of 
all sorts, to whom they bring great profit ; for the sake of 
which they are obliged to keep them well, and not over- 
work, starve, or famish them, besides other inducements to 
favor them, which is done in a great degree, to such espe- 
cially that are laborious, careful, and honest ; though indeed 
some Masters, careless of their own interest and reputation, 
are too cruel and negligent. 



68 COMPETITION. 

" The negroes are not only increased by fresh supplies from 
Africa and the West India Islands, but also are very prolific 
among themselves; and they that are born tliere talk good 
English, and effect our language, habits, and customs ; and 
•tho' they be naturally of a barbarous and cruel temper, yet 
are they kept under by severe discipline upon occasion, and 
by good laws are prevented from running away, injuring 
the English or neglecting their business. Their work (or 
chimerical hard slavery) is not very laborious; their greatest 
hardship consisting in that they and their posterity are not 
at their own liberty or disposal, but are the property of their 
owners; and when they are free they know not how to 
provide so well for themselves generally ; neither did they 
live so plentifully nor (many of them) so easily in their own 
country where they are made slaves to one another, or taken 
captive by their enemies. Their work is to take care of the 
stock, and plant Corn, Tobacco, Fruits and which is not 
harder than thrashing, hedging, or ditching; besides, though 
they are out in the violent heat, wherein they delight, yet 
in wet or cold weather there is little occasion for their 
working in the fields, in which few will let them be abroad, 
lest by this means they might get sick or die, which would 
prove a great loss to their owners, a good Negroe being 
sometimes worth three (nay four) score pounds sterling, 
if he be a tradesmen ; so that upon this (if upon no other 
account) they are obliged not to overwork them, but to clooth 
and feed them sufiiciently, and take care of their health." 

The planters, supplied with greater facilities for the work, 
now increased the size of their tobacco plantations, " taking 
up new ground " (clearing the land) and planting a much 
larger area. The first exportation of the colony's tobacco 
was brought into competition with that of much finer flavor, 
which had acquired an established reputation long before 
the English began the culture of the plant in the New World. 
The Spanish, Dutch and Portuguese had long monopolized 
its culture and trade, and brought from St. Domingo, 
Jamaica, St. Thomas, the Phillippine Islands, West Florida, 
and various parts of South America, several varieties of 
tobacco of excellent quality, and which sold at an exorbitant 
price. On testing the tobacco grown by the London and 
Plj^mouth companies it was found to be sweet and mild in 
flavor, of a light color, and well adapted for smoking. On 



GROWING SUCKERS. 



69 



its first introduction into England it sold for 3s. per pound, 
but as its culture increased the price lessened, until it was 
sold at one-half this amount. 

The planters, who at first cultivated small patches, now 
planted large fields of tobacco, and such was the greed for 
gain that some planters gathered a second crop upon the same 
field from the suckers left grooving upon the parent stalk. 
Tatham* says in regard to it : — 

" It has been customary in former ages to rear an inferior 
plant from the sucker which projects from the root after the 
cutting of an early plant; and thus a second crop has often 
been obtained from the same field by one and the same course 
of culture; and although this scion is of a sufficient quality 
for smoking, and might become preferred in the weaker 
kinds of snufF, it has been (I think very properly) thought 
eligible to prefer a prohibitory law, to a risk of imposition 
by means of similitude. The practice of cultivating suckers 
is on these accounts not only discountenanced as fraudulent, 
but the constables are strictly enjoyned ex officio to make 
diligent search, and to employ the x>osse commitatus in 
destroying such crops ; a law indeed for which, to the credit 




DESTROYING SrCKERS. 



of the Virginians, there is seldom occasion ; yet some few 
instances have occurred, within my day, where the consta- 
bles have very honorably carried it into execution in a 



•Essay on Tobacco, London, 1800. 



70 VIRGINIA LANDS. 

manner truly exemplary, and productive of public good." 

Fairholt says of tlio same subject : — 

" It was sometimes tbe custom with planters to reset the 
suckers, and thus grow a double crop on one field, such con- 
duct was disallowed ; for the reason that the crop was inferior, 
and the more honest grower, who conscientiously cleared his 
plants, and gave them abundance of room to grow, was dis- 
honestly competed with ; and the first rate character of the 
Virginian crop prejudiced by the action." 

Fairholt makes a mistake in speaking of the planter as 
re-setting the suckers, and his statement shows him to be 
entirely unacquainted with the habits of the plant. As soon 
as the plants are harvested, the stump of the plant remaining 
in the ground puts forth one or more vigorous suckers or 
shoots, which often in a good season grow almost as high as 
the pai-ent stalk. In some tobacco-growing sections one or 
two crops of suckers are gathered besides the first crop. 

The Creole planters in Louisiana are said to grow three 
crops in this manner, the first or parent crop and two growths 
of suckers. The quality of leaf, however, is greatly inferior, 
as it is small and thin and lacking in all the qualities neces- 
sary for a fine leaf. The planters now adopted now methods 
of culture, and cultivated several species of the plant known 
as Oronoko and little Frederick, although they did not fer- 
tilize the fields, even when the soil became impoverished, but 
simply took new fields for its culture. 

Hugh Jones says of the kinds of tobacco grown in 
Virginia : — 

"The land between the James and York rivers seemes 
nicely adapted for sweet scented tobacco; for 'tis observed 
that the goodness decreaseth the farther you go to the north- 
ward of the one, and the southward of the other ; but this 
may be (I believe) attributed in some measure to the seed and 
management, as well as to the land and latitude : For on 
York river in a small tract of land called Diggens neck, which 
is poorer than a great deal of other land in the same latitude, 
by a particular seed and management, is made the famous 
crop known by the name of E Dees, remarkable for its mild 
taste and fine smell." He speaks of the planters and their 
plantations as follows :—" Neither the interestsnor inclina- 
tions of the Virginians induces them to cohabit in towns: so 



PICTURE OF EARLY PLANTERS. 71 

that they are not forward in contributing their assistance 
towards the making of particnhir places, every plantation 
affording the owner the provision of a little market ; where- 
fore they most commonly build upon some convenient spot 
or neck of land in their own plantation, though towns are 
laid out and established in each county. 

" The whole country is a perfect forest, except where the 
woods are cleared for plantations, and old fields, and where 
have been formerly Indian towns, and poisoned fields and 
meadows, where the timber has been burnt down in fire 
hunting and otherwise; and about the creeks and rivers are 
large rank morasses or marshes, and up the country arc poor 
savannahs. Tiie gentlemen's seats are of late built for the 
most part of good brick, and many of timber very handsome, 
commodious, and capacious; and likewise the connnon 
planters live in pretty timber houses, neater than the farm 
houses are generally in England : With timber also are 
built houses for the overseers and out-houses; among which 
is the kitchen apart from the dwelling house, because of the 
smell of hot victuals, offensive in hot weathpr. 

" The habits, life, customs, computations of the Virginians, 
are much the same as about London, which they esteem 
their home; and for the most part have contemptible notions 
of England, and wrong sentiments of Bristol, and the other 
out-posts, which they entertain from seeing and hearing the 
common dealers, sailors, and servants that come from those 
towns, and the country places in England and Scotland, 
whose language and manners are strange to them ; for the 
planters and even the native negroes generally talk good 
English without idiom and tone, and can discourse handsomely 
upon most common subjects: and conversing with persons 
belonging to trade and navigation from London, for the 
most part they are much civilized, and Avear the best of 
clothes according to their station ; nay, sometimes too good 
for their circumstances, being ibr the generality, comely hand- 
some persons of good features and fine complexions (if they 
take care) of good manners and address. 

" They are not very easily persuaded to the improvement 
of useful inventions (except a few, such as sawing mills) 
neither are they great encouragers of manufactures, because 
of the trouble and certain expense in attempts of this kind, 
with uncertain prospect of gain ; whereas by their staple 
eonunodity, tobacco, they are certain to get a plentiful 
provision ; nay, often very great estates. Upon this account 
they think it folly to take off" their hands (or negroes) and 



72 LARGE PLANTATIONS. 

employ their care and time about anything that may make them 
lessen their crop of tobacco. So that though they are apt to 
learn, yet they are fond of and will follow their own ways, 
humors and notions, being not easily brought to ne\r 
projects and schemes ; so that I question if they would have 
been improved upon by the Mississippi or South sea, or any 
otlier such monstrous bubbles. The common planters lead- 
ing easy lives without much labor, or any manly exercise, 
except horse-racing, nor diversion, except cock-lighting, in 
which some greatly delight. 

" This easy way of living, and the heat of the summer, 
makes some very lazy, who are then said to be climate-stnick 
They are such lovers of riding, that almost every ordinary 
person keeps a horse ; and I have known some spend the 
morning in ranging several miles in the woods to lind and 
catch their horses to ride only two or three miles to the Church, 
to the Court-House or to a Horse-Race, where they generally 
appoint to meet upon business ; and are more certain of finding 
those that they want to speak or deal with, than at their 
home. No people can entertain their friends with better cheer 
and welcome ; and stranger and traveler is liere treated in the 
most free, plentiful, and hospitable manner ; so that a few 
Inns or Ordinaries on the road are suliicient." 

This is no doubt a correct picture of the early planters of 
Virginia. Many of them became the owners of large plant- 
ations and all those who were successful growers of tobacco 
became wealthy in proportion to the quality of leaf produced. 

The merchants, factors or store-keepers bought up the 
tobacco of the planters paying in goods or " current Spanish 
money, or with sterling bills payable in Great Britain." At 
first the cultivation of tobacco by the colony was confined to 
Jamestown and the immediate vicinity, but as the colony 
increased and the country became more densely populated, 
plantations were laid out in the various counties and a large 
quantity was produced some ways from the great center 
Jamestown ; accord inglj'' various methods were adopted to 
get the tobacco to market, some of which was sent by boats 
or canoes down the rivers, while some was conveyed in carts 
and wagons while another method was by rolling in hoops. 

Tatham in his interesting work on tobacco, gives the fol- 
lowing description of the method : 



GETTING TO MARKET. 



73 



"I believe rolling tobacco the distance of many hundred 
miles, is a mode of conveyance peculiar to Virginia; and 
for which the early population of that country deserve a 
very handsome credit. JS'ecessity (that very prolific mother 
of invention), first suggested the idea of rolling by hand ; 
time and experience have led to the introduction of liorses, 
and have ripened human skill, in this kind of carriage, to a 
degree of perfection which merits the adoption of the mother 
countr}"^, but which will be better explained under the next 
head of this subject. 

" The hogsheads, which are designed to be rolled in com- 
mon hoops, are made closer in the joints than if they were 
intended for the wagon ; and are plentifully hooped with 
strong hickory hoops (which is the toughest kind of wood), 
with the bark upon them, which remains for some distance a 




CARRYING TOBACCO TO MARKET. 

protection against the stones. Two hickory saplings are 
affixed to the liogshead, for shafts by boring an auger-hole 
through them to receive the gudgeons or pivots, in the man- 
ner of a field rolling-stone; and these receive pins of wood, 
with square tapered points, which are admitted through 
square mortises made central in the lieading, and driven a 
considerable depth into the solid tobacco. 'Upon the hind 
part of these shafts, between the horses and the hogshead, a 
few light planks are nailed, and a kind of little cart body is 
constructed of a sufficient size to contain a bag or two of 



f4 VIRGINIA PLANT-BED. 

provender and provision, together with an axe, and such 
other tools as may be needed upon the road, in ease of 
accident. In this manner they set out to the inspection in 
companies, very often joining society with the wagons, and 
always pursuing the same method of encamping." 

The methods of making the plant bed, cultivating and 
harvesting, by the early planters may be interesting to all 
growers of the plant and are here described as showing the 
progress made in cutting tobacco from that time until now. 

" In spring red seed, in preference to the white, is put into 
a clean put ; milk or stale beer is poured upon it, and it is 
left for two or three days in this state ; it is then mixed with 
a quantity of line fat earth, and set aside in a hot chamber, 
till the seeds begin to put out shoots. They are then sown 
in a hot-bed. "When the young plants have grown to a 
finger's length, they are taken up between the fifteenth and 
twenty-second of May, and planted in ground that has been 
previously well manured with the dung of doves or swine. 
They are placed at square distances of one and a half-foot 
from one another. In dry weather, they are now to be 
watered with lukewarm water softly showered upon them, 
between sunset and twilight. "When these plants are full 
two feet high, the top of the stems are broken off, to make 
the leaves grow thicker and broader. Here and there are 
left a few plants without having their tops broken off, in 
order that they may afford seeds for another year. Through- 
out the summer the other plants are from time to time, 
pruned at the top, and the whole field is carefully weeded to 
make the growth of the leaf so much the more vigorous. 

" In the month of September, from the sixteenth day, and 
between the hours of ten in the morning and four^ in the 
afternoon, the best leaves are to be taken off. It is more 
advantageous to pluck the leaves when they are dry than 
when they are moist. When plucked they are to be immedi- 
ately brought home, and hung upon cords within the house 
to dry, in as full exposure as is possible to the influence of 
the sun and air ; but so as to receive no rain. In this expo- 
sure they remain till the months of March and April follow- 
ing ; when they are to be pnt up in bundles, and conveyed 
to the store-house, in which they may be kept, that they 
may be there till more perfectly dried by a moderate heat. 
Within eight days they must be removed to a different 
place, where they are to be sparingly sprinkled with salt 
water, and left till the leaves shall be no longer warm to the 



MARYLAND PLANT-BED. 



75 



feeling of the hand. A barrel of water with six handfuls of 
salt are the proportions. After all this the tobacco leaves 
may be laid aside for commercial exportation. They will 
remain fresh for three years." 

In Maryland they formerly prepared the land for a plant- 
bed by burning upon it a great quantity of brush-wood, 








^s^ 



ENRICHING PLANT-BED. 



afterwards raking the surface fine ; the seed was then sowed 
broadcast. The young plants were kept free from weeds, 
and were transplanted when about two inches high. 
The cultivation of tobacco gradually spread from one State 
to another. From Virginia it was introduced into North 
Carolina and Maryland and finally Kentucky which is now 
the largest producing tobacco State in the Union. The 
demand for Virginia tobacco continued to increase and long 
before the Revolutionary war, Virginia exported annually 
thousands of hogsheads of leaf tobacco. Half a century 
ago the plant began to be cultivated in Ohio and from the 
first grew remarkably well, producing a leaf adapted for both 
cutting and cigar purposes. 

Tobacco was planted in New Netherland (New York) by 



76 TOBACCO GROWING IN NEW YORK AND LOUISIANA. 

the early Dutch settlers and in 1638 "had become a staple 
production," In 1639 " from Vii-ghiia numbers of persona 
whose terms of service had expired, were attracted to Man- 
hattan, where they introduced improved modes of cultivating 
tobacco." Van Twiller was himself a grower of the plant 
and had his tobacco farm at Greenwich. Soon after its 
cultivation began it was subjected to Excise ; and regulations 
were published to check the abuses which injured "the high 
name " it had gained in foreign countries. * 

Wailes says of the early cultivation of tobacco in 
Mississippi : 

" When the country came under the dominion of Spain, a 
market was opened in New Orleans ; a trade in tobacco was 
established, and a fixed and remunerating price was paid for 
it, delivered at the king's warehouses. Tobacco thus became 
the first marketable staple production of Missisippi." f 

An English writer has the following account of the culture 
of tobacco in Louisiana by the French : 

" Tobacco is another plant indigenous to this part of 
America; the French colonists cultivated it with such success 
that had they received any encouragement from their 
government they might soon have rivalled Virginia and. 
Maryland ; but instead of this they were taxed heavily for 
cultivating it, by duties laid on the trade; what they pro- 
duced was of so excellent a quality, as to sell some at five 
shillings a pound. There is one advantage in this culture 
here which ought not to be forgotten ; in Louisiana the 
French planters after the tobacco is cut, weeded and cleaned 
the ground on which it grew the roots, push forth fresh 
shoots, which are managed in the same manner as the first 
crop. By this means a second crop is made .on the same 
ground, and sometimes a third. These seconds indeed, as 
they fire called, do not usually grow so high as the first plant, 
but notwithstanding they make very good tobacco." 

During the reign of the Stuarts, the plant was first culti- 
vated in New England but only in small quantities :}: and 

* Jacob van Clinrlrr aiirt Davlil Provoost w'TC appolrtod Inspectors of the new staplo 
tobacco. "In 16J2tlie cniTiiiioiially >>t Manhnttan waxinlonma that, to bIiow iluir good 
intrntinns, the .\iii8t<-i(laincliicctoi.sliHil dctriniiiiKl to l;iki- oft'llic ( xport Outy of tobacco." 

till 17S3 A'f. Win. Dunliar writes: "Tin! soil <if Katclu z i^ particularly favorable for 
tobacco and thirc aro (.vcrsrer.s there, who will nlnmst. engage to iModucc you between two 
and thre<! hog.«hcads to the liaiul bcfidea provisions." 

t " Evnry farmer plants a quantity of tobneeo near bis bouse tn proportion to the size Of 
his family. It is likewise very necessary that tt(<-y should plant tobacco, because U is 80 
nnlversally smoked by the cominou people."'— JTaim's travels in Nurllt, Ainerica, 1712. 



NEW ENGLAND TOBACCO. 77 

used solely for smoking. About 1835 the plant received 
more attention from the ftirmers living in the Connecticut 
valley containing some of the iinest tobacco land in the coun- 
try. They found by repeated trials that the soil was well 
adapted to the production of a finer leaf tobacco than any 
they had ever seen. At this time Kentucky and Havana 
tobacco were used in the manufacture of cigars, but on testing 
American tobacco or as it is now known '' Connecticut seed 
leaf" it was found to make the finest wrappers yet produced, 
and consequently the best looking cigars. From that time 
its reputation has kept pace with its cultivation, until it now 
enjoys a world wide popularity. As a wrapping tobacco it 
towers far above the seed products of other states and can 
never have a successful competitor in the other varieties now 
cultivated in the Middle and Western States. Doubtless 
America furnishes the finest varieties of tlie plant now culti- 
vated, suited for all kinds of manufacturing, and adapted to 
all the various forms in which it is used. 

The great diversity of soil and climate renders this prob- 
able while actual experiments and improved methods of cul- 
ture have demonstrated it to a certainty. Thousands of 
hogsheads, cases, and bales are annually shipped to all parts 
of the world and the demand for American tobacco is greater 
than for the varieties grown in the Old "World. More than 
two hundred and fifty years have passed since the London 
and Plymouth Companies began its cultivation in the Old 
Dominion, and on the same soil where the red man grew his 
"uppowac." Virginia leaf still continues to flourish, and 
to-day it is the great agricultural product of the State. 

From a small beginning, like tlie plant itself it has 
developed into a great and increasing industry and its culture 
become a source of wealth unprecedented in agricultural 
history. Could the sapient James I. and his successors the 
Stuarts, now look upon this cherished production of the 
world, they would discover a commercial prosperity connected 
with those nations which have fostered and encouraged its 
growth far in advance of those who have frowned upon the 



78 



COMMERCIAL VALUE OF TOBACCO. 



plant and prohibited or hindered its cultivation. Saint 
Pierre alluding to the beneficence of nature and of the follj 
and cruelty of man as contrasted says : 

"When the princes of Europe went Gospel in hand, to 




SHIPPING TOBACCO. 



lay waste Asia, they brought back the plague, the leprosy 
and the small-pox, but nature showed to a Dervish the coffee 
tree in the mountains of Yemen, and at the moment when 
nature brought curses on us through the Crusaders, it 
brought delights to us through the cup of a Mohammedan 
Monk. The descendants of "those princes took possession of 
America, and transmitted to us by this conquest, an inex- 
haustible succession of wars and maladies. While they 
were exterminating the inhabitants of America with cannon, 
a Carib invited sailors to smoke his Calumet as a signal of 
peace. The perfume of the tobacco vanquished their torments 
and their troubles, and the use of tobacco was spread all over 
the earth. While the afflictions of the two worlds came 
from artillery, which kings call their last resort, the consola- 
tions of civilized nations flowed from the pipe of a savage." 
It seems hardly possible to draw a more graphic picture of 
the blessings diffused by the balmy plant, than that just given. 
Its peculiar charms and soothing influence are well calculated 



TOBACCO A BLESSING. 7j) 

to inspire in the breast of man, feelings of peace and happi- 
ness, rather than elements of discord and strife. The pipe 
of a king burns not more freely the shreds of the plant, than 
it does the last remnant of hostile feelings and the recollec- 
tions of bitter wrongs ; while the snuff-box of the diplomat 
contains the precious dust that has soothed the fierce hatred of 
rival houses and cemented the divided factions of a totterino- 
throne. 




CHAPTER IV. 

TOBACCO IN EUROPE. 

HE discovery of the tobacco plant in America by 
European voyagers aroused their cupidity no less 
than their curiosity. They saw in its use by the 
Indians a custom which, if engrafted upon the civil- 
ization of the Old World, would prove a source of revenue 
commensurate with their wildest visions of power and wealth. 
This was particularly the case with the Spanish and Portu- 
guese conquerors, whose thirst for gold was gratified by its 
discovery. The finding by the Spaniards of gold, silver, and 
the balmy plant, and by the Portuguese of valuable and 
glittering gems, opened up to Spain and Portugal three 
great sources of wealth and power. But while the Spaniards 
were the first discoverers of the plant there seems to be con- 
flicting opinions as to which nation first began its culture, and 
whether the plant was cultivated first in the Old World or 
in the New. Humboldt says: — 

" It was neither from Virginia nor from South America, 
but from the Mexican province of Yucatan that Europe 
received the first tobacco seeds about the year 1559.* The 
Spaniards became acquainted with tobacco in the West India 
Islands at the end of the 15th Century, and the cultivation 
of Tobacco preceded the cultivation of the potato in Europe 
more than one hundred and twenty years. When Sir Walter 
Raleigh brought tobacco from Virginia to England in 1586, 

•Musspy In his Essay on Tobncco ppcords " That Cortcz sent a epeclmen of the plant to the 
king of Spain lu 1S19. Yucatan was discovered by Heruaodez Cordova in 1517, and la lS19waa 
first settled. 



INTRODUCTION. 81 

whole fields of it were already cultivated in Portugal.* It 
was also previously known in France." 

Another author says of its introduction into Europe : — 

" The seeds of the tobacco plant were first brought to 
Europe by Gonzalo Hernandez de Oviedo, who introduced 
it into Spain, where it was first cultivated as an ornamental 
plant, till JVIonardesf extolled it as possessed of medicinal 
virtues.":!; 

Murray says of the first cultivation of tobacco and potatoes 
in the Old World :— 

"Amidst the numerous remarkable productions ushered 
into the Old Continent from the New World, there are two 
which stand pre-eminently conspicuous from their general 
adoption. Unlike in their nature, both have been received 
as extensive blessings — the one by its nutritive powers tends 
to support, the other by its narcotic virtues to soothe and 
comfort the human frame — the potato and tobacco ; but very 
different was the favor with which these plants were viewed. 
The one long rejected, by the slow o^jeration of time, and, 
perhaps, of necessity, was at length cherished, and has become 
the support of millions, but nearly one hundred and twenty 
years passed away before even a trial of its merits was 
attempted ; whereas, the tobacco from Yucatan, in less than 
seventy years after the discovery, appears to have been exten- 
sively cultivated in Portugal, and is, perhaps, the most gen- 
erally adopted suj)erfluou8 vegetable product known; for 
sugar and opium are not in such common use. The potato 
by the starch satisfies the hunger ; the tobacco by its morphia 
calms its turbulence of the mind. The former becomes a 
necessity required, the latter a gratification sought for." 

It would appear then that the year 1559 was about the 
period of the introduction of tobacco into Europe. Phillip 
II. of Spain sent Oviedo to visit Mexico and note its produc- 
tions and resources ; returning he presented " His Most 
Catholic Majesty " with the seeds of the plant. In the fol- 
lowing year it was introduced into France and Italy. It was 
first brought to France by Jean !Nicot of Nismes in Langue- 
doc, who was sent as ambassador to Sebastian, KJing of 

*Spaln began Us culture In Mexico on the coast of Caraccas at the Islands of St. Domingo 
and Trinidad, and particularly in Louisiana. 

■fPourchat declares that the Portuguese brought It into Europe from Tobago, an Island In 
the West Indies ; hut this is hardly probable, as the Island was never under the Portuguese 
dominion. 

tMonardes wrote upon It only from the small account he had of It from the Brazilians." 

6 



82 THE ORIGINAL IMPORTER. 

Portugal, and who obtained while at Lisbon some tobacco 
seed from a Dutch merchant who had brought it from Florida.* 
Nicot returned to France in 1561, and presented the Queen, 
Catherine de Medicis, with a few leaves of the plant.f 

As the history of Nicot is so intimately connected with 
that of the plant, a short sketch of this original importer will 
doubtless be interesting to all lovers of the weed : — 

"John Nicot, Sieur de Yillemain, was born at Nismes in 
1530, and died at Paris in 1600. He was the son of a notary 
at Nismes, and started in life with a good education, but 
with no fortune. Finding that his native town offered no 
suitable or sufficient field for his energies, he went to Paris 
and strove hard to extend his studies as a scholar and his 
connections as an adventurer. He made the acquaintance of 
some courtiers, who felt or affected an interest in learning 
and in learned men. His manners were insinuating; his 
character was pliable. When presented at court he succeeded 
in gaining the esteem and confidence of Henry XL, the hus- 
band of Catherine de Medicis. Francis II., the son of Henry 
IL, and the first husband of Mary Stuart, continued to Nicot 
the favor of which Henry II. had deemed him worthy, and 
sent him in 1560 as ambassador to Sebastian, King of Portu- 
gal. He was successful in his mission. But it was neither 
his talents as a diplomatist, nor his remarkable mind, nor Jiis 
solid erudition, which made Nicot immortal. It was by 
popularizing tobacco in France that he gained a lasting fame. 

" It is said that it was at Lisbon that Nicot became 
acquainted with the extraordinary properties of tobacco. 
But it is likewise stated with quite as much confidence, that 
a Flemish merchant, who had just returned from America, 
offered Nicot at Bordeaux, where they met, some seeds of 
the tobacco, telling him of their value. The seeds Nicot 
sent to Catherine de Medicis, and on arriving in Paris lie 
gave her some leaves of tobacco. Hence, when tobacco began 
to creep into use in France it was called Queen's Herb or 
Medicean Herb.:j: The cultivation of tobacco, except as a 
fancy plant, did not begin in France till 1626 ; and John 

♦Parkinson in his Herball [London, 16401 says:— "It is thoiifrht bv some that John Kicot, 
this Frenchman, being agent in Portupall for the Fnucli King, fei.t tliis suvt of tobacco 
[Brazill and cot any other to the French Qmene, unci is called thcriforc lierba licgiiin, and 
from Nicotlana, which is probably because the Portugalls and not the Spaniards weie mas- 
ters of Brazile at that time." 

t" Sir .John Nicot sent some seeds of it into France, to Kin" Francis II., the Queen Mother, 
and Lord Jarnac, Governor of Rochel, anJ sevi-ral others of the French Lords.^' 

JThe Abbe Jacques Gohory, tlie author of the tlrtt book ■written on tobaoao, proposed to 
call it Catherinaiue or Medicee, to record Ihe name of Midicis and the medicinal virtues of 
the plant ; but the name of Nicot Bupersedtd these, and botanists have perpetuated it lu iho 
genus Nicotiana."—Le Maout and Decaiane. 



A QUAINT DESCRIPTION. 83 

N'icot could have had no presentiment of the agricultural, 
commercial, financial and social importance which tobacco 
was ultimately to assume. Nicot published two works. 
The first was an edition of the History of France or of the 
Franks, in Latin, written by a Monk called Aimonious, who 
lived in the tenth century. The second was a ' Treasury of 
the French Language, Ancient and Modern.' " 

Stevens and Liebault in the " Country Farm " * give the 
following account of its early introduction into France and 
the wonderful cures produced by its use : 

" Nicotiana though it have (has) beene but a while knowne 
in France yet it holdeth the fii'st and principall place amongst 
Physicke herbs, by reason of his singular and almost diuine 
(divine) vertues, such as you shall heare of hereafter, whereof 
(because none either of the old or new writers that have 
written of the nature of plants, have said anything), I am 
willing to lay open the whole history, as I have come by it 
through a deere friend of mine, the first author, inventor, 
and bringer of this herb into France : as also of many both 
Spaniards, Portugals, and others which have travelled into 
Florida, a country of the Indians, from whence this herbe 
came, to put the same in writing to relieve such griefe and 
travell, as have heard of this herbe, but neither know it nor 
the properties thereof . This herbe is called Nicotiana of the 
name of an ambassador which brought the first knowledge 
of it into this realme, in like manner as many plants do as 
yet retaine the names of certaine Greekes and Romans, who 
being strangers in divers countries, for their common-wealth's 
service, have from thence indowed their own countree with 
many plants, whereof there was no knowledge before. Some 
call it the herbe of Queen mother, because the said ambassa- 
dor Lord Nicot did first send the same unto the Queen 
mother, f (as you shall understand by and by) and for being 
afterwards by her given to divers others to plant and make 
to grow in this country. Others call it by the name of the 
herbe of the great Prior, because the said Lord a while after 
sailing into these western seas, and happening to lodge neere 
unto the said Lord ambassador of Lisbone, gathered divers 
plants thereof out of his garden, and set them to increase 
here in France, and there in greater quantitie, and with 

•London 1606. 

t George Buchanan, the Scotch Philosopher and poet totor of James I., had a strong aver- 
sion to Catherine of Medicis, and In one of his Latin epigrams, alludes to the herb being 
called J/erfto'c advising all who valued their health to shun it, not so much from its being 
naturally hurtful, but that it needs must become poisonous if called by so hateful a name. 



84: WONDERFUL CURES. 

more care than any other besides him, he did so highly 
esteeme thereof for the exceeding good qualities sake. 

" The Spaniards call it Tobaco, it were better to call it 
Nicotiana, after the name of the Lord who first sent it into 
France, to the end that we may give him the honor which he 
hath deserved of ns, for having furnished our land with so 
rare and singular an herbe: and thus much for the name, 
now listen unto the whole historie : Master John Nicot, one 
of the king's counsell, being ambassador for his Maiestie 
(Majesty) in the realme of Portiugall, in the yeere of our 
Lord God, 1559. 60. and 61. went on a day to see the 
monuments and northie places of the said king of Portiugall : 
at which time a gentleman keeper of the said monuments 
presented him with this herbe as a strange plant brought 
from Florida. The nobleman Sir Nicot having procured it 
to growe in his garden, where it had put forth and multiplied 
very greatly, was aduertifed (notified) on a dale by one of 
his pages, that a yoong boie kinsman of the said page, had 
laide (for triall sake) the said herbe, pressed, the substance 
and juice and altogether, upon an ulcer which he had upon 
his cheeke, neere unto his nose, next neighbor to a Noli me 
tangere, (a cancer) as having already seazed upon the cartil- 
ages, and that by the use thereof it was become marvellous 
well : upon this occasion the nobleman ISTicot called the boie 
to him, and making him to continue the applying of this 
herbe for eight or ten days, the Noli me tangere became 
thoroughly kild : nowe they had sent oftetimes unto one of 
the king's most famous phisitions, the said boie during the 
time of this worke and operation to make and see the pro- 
ceeding and working of the said Nicotiana, and having in 
charge to do tlie same until the end of ten days, the said 
phisition then beholding him, assured him that the Noli me 
tangere was dead, as indeed the boie never felt anything of 
it at any time afterward. 

" Some certain time after, one of the cooks of the said 
ambassador having almost all his thombe (thumb) cut off 
from his hand, with a great kitchin knife, the steward 
running unto the said Nicotiana, made to him use of it five or 
six dressings, by the ende of which the wounde was healed. 
From this time forward this herbe began to become famous 
in Lisbon, where the king of Portiugal's court was at that 
time, and the vertues thereof much spoken of, and the 
common people began to call it the ambassador's herbe. 
Kow upon this occasion there came certain days after, a 



THE "HERBE GREWE IN REPUTATION." 85 

gentleman from the fields being father unto one of the pages 
of the said Lord ambassador, who was troubled with an ulcer 
in his legge of two years continuance, and craved of the said 
Lord some of his herbe, and using it in manner afore men- 
tioned, he was healed by the end of ten or twelve dales. 
After this yet the herbe grewe still in greater reputation, 
inasmuch as that many hasted out of all corners to get some 
of this herbe. And among the rest, there was one woman 
which had a great ring worme, covering all her face like a 
mask, and having taken deepe roote, to whom the said Lord 
caused this Petum to be given, and withall the manner of 
using it to be told her, and at the end of eight or ten dales, 
this woman being thoroughly cured, came to shewe herself 
unto the said Lord, and how that she was cured. There 
came likewise a captain bringing with him his son diseased 
with the king's evill, unto the said Lord Ambassador, for to 
send him into France, upon whom there was some triall 
made of the said herbe, whereupon within four dales he 
began to show great signs and tokens of healing, and in the 
end was thoroughly cured of his king's evil." 

Italy received the first plant from Santa Grope,* who, like 
Nicot, obtained the seed in Lisbon. In 1575 first appeared a 
figure of the plant in Andre Theret's " Cosmographie," 
which was but an imperfect representation of the plant. It 
was supposed by many on its discovery to grow like the 
engraving given — in form resembling a tree or shrub rather 
than an herb. Tobacco was first brought to England by Sir 
John Hawkins, who obtained the plant in Florida in 1565, 
and afterwards by Sir Francis Drake.f The first planters of 
it in England were said to be Captain Grenfield and Sir 
Francis Drake. One account of its introduction into Eng- 
land is as follows : 

"The plant was first used by Sir "Walter Raleigh and 
others, who had acquired a taste for it in Yirginia.ij: Among 

*The Pied Bull Inn, at Islington, was the first house in Englandwhere tobacco was smoked, 
jrhile Moll Cut-Purse, a noted pickpocket who nourished In the time of Charles II., ia said 
to have been the first Englishwoman who smoked tobacco. . 

fit was Introduced, about 1520, Into Portugal and Spain by Doctor Hernandez of Toledo: 
into Italy by Thornabon ahd the Cardinal de SainteCroif, into England by Captain Drake' 
and into France by Andre Theret, a gray friar."— ie Mao ut and Decaisne's General System 
of Botany (Paris 1868). 

JShortsaysof its introduction into England: "Sir Walter Raleigh's Marriners, under Mr. 
Kalph Lane, his Agent in Virginia first hrought this Commodity into England Anno 1584 ; and 
that famous Proprietor of this Plantation foresaw good reasons to introduce the use of it, 
however King James might afterwards, through his own personal Distaste both of it and, 
nim, wrote his Counterblast against it ; a worii surely consistent with the Pen of no Prince, 
but one of his Politicks." 



86 



DIFFERENCE OF OPINIONS. 



the natives the nsnal mode emploj^ed in smoking the plant 
was by means of hollow canes, and pipes made of wood and 

decorated with copper 
and green stones. To 
deprive it of its acidity, 
some of the natives 
were wont to pass the 
smoke through bulbs 
containing water, in 
which aromatic and me- 
dicinal herbs had been 
infused." 

Neander ascribes this 
invention to the Per- 
sians; butMagnenus 
rather attributes it to the 
Dutch and English, to 
the latter of whom at- 
taches the credit of 
having invented the clay 
pipes of modern times. 
Some writers have con- 
cluded that the plant 
served as a narcotic in 
some parts of Asia. 
Liebaut thinks it was 
known in Europe* 
many years before the 
discovery of the New World, and asserts that the plant 
had been found in the Ardennes. Magnenus, however, 
claims its origin as transatlantic and affirms as his belief that 
the winds had doubtless carried the seeds from one continent 
to the other. Pallos says that among the Chinese, and 
among the Mongol tribes who had the most intercourse with 
them, the custom of smoking is so general, so frequent, and 
has become so indispensable a luxury ; the tobacco purse 
affixed to their belt so necessary an article of dress ; the form 
of the pipes, from which the Dutch seem to have taken the 




OLD ENGRAVING OP TOBACCO. 



*Jamea the First also Inclines to this belief, declaring tobacco to be " a common berb 
Which (though under divers names) grows almost everywhere." 



A SMOKER'S RHAPSODY. 87 

model of theirs, so original ; and, finally, the preparation of 
the leaves so peculiar, that they could not possibly derive all 
this from America by way of Europe, especially as India, 
where the practice of smoking is not so general, intervenes 
between Persia and China, Meyen also states that the con- 
sumption of tobacco in the Chinese empire is of immense 
extent, and the practice seems to be of great antiquity, "for 
on very old sculptures I have observed the very same tobacco 
pipes which are still used." Besides, we now know that the 
plant which furnishes the Chinese tobacco is even said to 
grow wild in the East Indies. 

" Tobacco," says Loudon, " was introduced into the county 
of Cork, with the potatoe, by Sir "Walter Raleigh." A 
quaint writer of this period says of the plant : " Tobacco, 
that excellent plant, the use whereof (as of fifth element) the 
world cannot want, is that little shop of Nature, wherein her 
whole workmanship is abridged ; where you may see earth 
kindled into fire, the fire breathe out an exhalation, which 
enteriirg in at the mouth walks through the regions of a 
man's brain, drives out all ill vapors but itself, draws down 
all bad humors by the mouth, which in time might breed a 
scab over the whole body, if already they have not; a plant 
of singular use ; for, on the one side Nature being an enemy 
to vacuity and emptiness and on the other, there being so 
many empty brains in the world as there are, how shall 
Nature's course be continued? How shall those empty 
brains be tilled but with air, Nature's immediate instrument 
to that purpose ? If with air, what so proper as your fume ; 
what fume so healthful as your perfume, what perfume so 
sovereign as tobacco. Besides the excellent edge it gives a 
man's wit, as they but judge that have been present at a 
feast of tobacco, where commonly all good wits are consoled ; 
what variety of discourse it begets, what sparks of wit it 
yields?"* 

The name of Sir Walter is intimately connected with the 
history of tobacco, and is associated with many of the bril- 
liant exploits and explorations during the reign of the 
illustrious Elizabeth.f His name has come down to us as 

*Awriterin the "New England Magazine" says In a different strain : "This Is the enemy that 
men put in their mouths, to steal away their health. This has flUed the camp, the court, tha 
grovo. It is found in tlie pulpit, the senate, the bar and the boudoir." 

tThorpe, in his "History and Mystery of Tobacco," relates the following anecdote : "Tra- 
dition says, that in the time of Queen Elizabeth Sir Walter Kaleigh used to Bit at his door 
with blrllugh Middleton and smolie." 



88 OLD SMOKERS. 

being that of the first smoker of tobacco in England,* and 
many amusing anecdotes are told of him and the new cus- 
tom which he introduced and sanctioned. Dixon has given 
us the following vivid picture of the great Elizabethan 
navigator : 

" In a pleasant room of Durham House, in the Strand, — a 
room overhanging a lovely garden, with the river, the old 
bridge, the towers of Lambeth Palace, and the flags of Paris 
Garden and the Globe in view, — three men may have often 
met and smoked a pipe in the days of Good Queen Bess, who 
are dear to all readers of English blood ; because, in the first 
place, they were the highest types of our race in genius and 
in daring; in the second place because the work of their 
hands has shaped the whole after-life of their countrymen in 
every sphere of enterprise and thought. That splendid Dur- 
ham House, in which the nine-days queen had been married 
to Guilford Dudley, and which had afterwards been the 
town-house of Elizabeth, belonged to Sir "Walter Raleigh, by 
whom it was held on leave from the queen. Ealeigh, a 
friend of "William Shakespeare and the players, was also a 
friend of Francis Bacon and the philosophers. Ealeigh is 
said to have founded the Mermaid Club ; and it is certain 
that he numbered friends among the poets and players. The 
proofs of his having known Shakespeare, though indirect, are 
strong. Of his long intercourse with Bacon every one is 
aware. Thus it requires no effort of the fancy to picture 
these three men as lounging in a window of Durham House, 
puffing the new Indian weed from silver bowls, discussing 
the highest themes in poetry and science, while gazing on 
the flower-beds and the river, the darting barges of dames 
and cavalier, and the distant pavilions of Paris Garden and 
the Globe." 

Its use by so distinguished a person as Raleigh was equiv- 
alent to its general introduction. f Aubrey says : 

" He was the first that brought tobacco into England, and 
into fashion. In our part — Malmsbury Hundred — it came 

•Dr. Thomas Short, In his work "Discourses on Tea, Tobacco, Punch, &c.," (London 1750,) 
Bays of the original smolcer : " Sir "Walter was the first that brought the Custom oL smoking 
it into Britain, upon his return from America; for he saw the natives of Florida, Brazil ana 
other places of the Indies, smoak it thus, they hung about their Necks little Pipes or Horns' 
made of the Leaves of the Date Tree, or of Reeds or Rushes ; and at the ends of them they 
put several dry Tobacco Leaves twisted and broken, and set the ends of them on fire, ana 
BUcked in as much of the smoak as they could." 

tSo common was the indulgence that in 1600, only seventeen years after Sir Francis Drake 
returned from America, and set the example of using tobacco, the French Embassador 
writes in his dispatches to Paris, that the peers, while engaged in the trials Of ^esexaud 
Soatbampton, deliberated upon their verdicts with pipes in their mouths! 



THE " QUEEN'S HERB." 



89 



first into fashion by Sir "Walter Long. They had first silver 
pipes. The ordinary sort made use of a walnut shell and a 




SIR WALTER RALEIGH. 



strawe. I have heard my grandfather Lyte say that one pipe 
was handed from man to man round the table. Sir Walter 
Raleigh standing in a stand at Sir Ro. Poyntz parke at 
Acton tooke a pipe of tobacco, which made the ladies quitte 
it till he had donne." 

A writer has truthfully said in regard to associating the / 
name and use of the plant with the primitive users of it. [ 

"The ambitious sought fame by associating themselves i 
wiih the introduction of the plant and its cultivation ; hence 1 
we find it named after cardinals, legates, and embassadors, I 
while in compliment to Catherine, wife of Henry the Second, ) 
it was called the Queen's herb." 

Kings now rushed into the tobacco trade. Those of Spain 
took the lead, and became the largest manufacturers of snuff 



*Savary says tbat tobacco has been known among the Persians for upwards of 400 yeara, 
and supposes that they received It from Egypt, and not from the East Indies. 



90 DRINKING TOBACCO. 

and cigars in Christendom, and the royal workshops of 
Seville are still the most extensive in Europe. Other raon- 
archs monopolized the business in their dominions, and all 
began to reap enormous profits from it, as most do at this 
day. In the year 1615 tobacco was first planted in Holland ; 
and in Switzerland in 1686. As soon as its cultivation 
became general in Spain and Portugal the tobacco trade was 
" farmed out," bringing an enormous revenue to those king- 
doms. About the beginning of the Seventeenth Century the 
Portuguese introduced into Hindostan and Persia* two 
things, pine-apples and tobacco. To the pine-apples no 
objection seems to have been made ; but to the tobacco the 
most strenuous resistance was ofiered by the sovereigns of 
the two countries. Spite, however, of punishments and pro- 
hibitions the use of tobacco spread with the rapidity of 
lightning. 
/ In England, tobacco taking soon became a favorite custom 
I not only with the loiterers about taverns and other public 
! places, but among the courtiers of Elizabeth. Smoking was 
\ called drinking tobacco, as the fashionable method was to 
\ " put it through the nose " or exhale it through the nostrils. 
/ At this period tobacco seemed to have nearly the same efi^ect 
j as it did upon the Indian, producing a sort of intoxication ; 
I thus in "The Perfuming of Tobacco" (1611) it is said: 
I " The smoke of tobacco drunke or drawen by a pipe, filleth 
/ the membranes of the braine, and astonisheth and filleth 
I many persons with such joy and pleasure, and sweet losse of 
I senses, that they can by no means be without it." 
\ The term "drinking tobacco" was not confined to Eng- 

land, but was used in Holland, France, Spain and Portugal, 
as the same method of blowing the smoke through the nos- 
trils, seemed to be everywhere in vogue. 

The use of tobacco increased very rapidly soon after its 
importation from Yirginia. The Spaniards and Portuguese 
had hitherto monopolized the trade, so that it brought 
enormous prices, some kinds selling for its weight in silver. 
As soon as its culture commenced in Yirginia the demand for 
West India tobacco lessened and Virginia leaf soon came 




ENGLISH GALLANTS. 



THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY. 91 

into favor, owing not more to the lowering of price than to 
the quality of the leaf.* This was about 1620, which some 
writers have called the golden age of tobacco. It had now 
become a prime favorite and was used by nearly all classes. 
Poets and dramatists sung its praises, while others wrote of 
its wonderful medicinal qualities.! Fops and knaves alike 
indulged in its use. 

"About the latter end of the sixteenth century, tobacco 
was in great vogue in London, with wits and ' gallants,' as 
the dandies of that age were called. To wear a pair of vel- 
vet breeches, with panes or slashes of silk, an enormous 
starched ruff, a gilt handled sword, and a Spanish dagger ; 
to play at cards or dice in- the chambers of the groom-porter, 
and smoke tobacco in the tilt-yard or at the play-house, were 
then the grand characteristics of a man of fashion. Tobac- 
conists' shops were then common ; and as the article, which 
appears to have been sold at a high price, was indispensable 
to the gay ' man about town,' he generally endeavored to 
keep his credit good with his tobacco-merchant. Poets and 
pamphleteers laughed at the custom, though generally they 
seem to have no particular aversion to an occasional treat to 
a sober pipe and a poute of sack. Your men of war, who 
had served in the Low Countries, and who taught young 
gallants the noble art of fencing, were particularly fond of 
tobacco ; and your gentlemen adventurers, who had served 
in a buccaneering expedition against the Spaniards, were no 
less partial to it. Sailors — from the captain to the ship-boy 
— all affected to smoke, as if the practice was necessary to 
their character ; and to ' take tobacco ' and wear a silver 
whistle, like a modern boatswain's mate, was the pride of a 
man-of-war's man. 

" Ben Jonson, of all our early dramatic writers, most 
frequently alludes to the practice of smoking. In his play 
of ' Every Man in his Humour,' first acted in 1598, Captain 
Bobadil thus extols in his own peculiar vein the virtues of 
tobacco ; while Cob, the water carrier, with about equal 
truth, relates some startling instances of its pernicious effects. 

•Neander, in his work on "Tobacologia" (London, 1622), mentions eighteen varieties of 
tobacco, or at least localities from where it was shipped to London, among which are the 
following: Varinas (uoiisidired tlie best), Brazil, Maracay, Orinoco, Margarita, Caracas, 
Cumana, Amazon, Virginia. Pliillipines. St. Lucia, Trinidad, and St. Domingo. 

t" The first author fsays an English writer) who wrote of this Plant was Charles Stepha- 
nas, in 15fi4 This was a mean, short, inaccurate Draught, till Dr. John Liebanlt wrote a 
whole Discourse of it next year, and put it into his second Book of Husbandry, which was 
every yearreprinted with additions and alterations, for twenty years after. He had a large 
Correspondence, a good Intelligence, and wrote the best of the age, and gathered the great- 
CBt stock of experience about this new Flaul." 



92 HUMOROUS QUOTATIONS. 

" ' Bobadil. Bod j o' me, here's the remainder of seven 
pound since yesterday was seven-night ! 'Tis your right 
Trinadado ! Did you never take any, Master Stephen ? 

" ' Stephen. No, truly, Sir ; but I'll learn to take it since 
you commend it so. 

" ' Bobadil. Sir, believe me upon my relation, — for what 
I tell you the world shall not reprove. I have been in the 
Indies where this herb grows, where neither myself, nor 
a dozen gentlemen more of my knowledge, have received 
the taste of any other nutriment in the world, for the space 
of one and twenty weeks, but the fume of this simple only. 
Therefore, it cannot be but 'tis most divine. Further, take 
it, in the true kind, so, it makes an antidote, that had you 
taken the most deadly poisonous plant in all Italy, it should 
expel it and clarify you with as much ease as I speak. And 
for your greenwound, your balsamum, and your St. John's- 
wort, are all mere gulleries and trash to it, especially your 
Trinidado : your Nicotian is good too. I could say what I 
know of it for the expulsion of rheums, raw humours, 
crudities, obstructions, with a thousand of this kind, but I 
profess myself no quack-salver : only thus much, by Hercules ; 
I do hold it, and will affirm it before any prince in Europe, 
to be the most sovereign and precious weed that ever the 
earth tendered to the use of man.' 

Cob. " ' By gad's me, I mar'l what pleasure or felicity they 
have in taking this roguish tobacco ! It's good for nothing 
but to choke a man and fill him full of smoke and embers. 
There were four died out of one house last week with taking 
of it, and two more the bell went for yesternight ; one of 
them, they say, will ne'er 'scape it : he voided a bushel of 
soot yesterday, upward and downward. By the stocks ! an' 
there were no wiser men than I, I'd have it present whipping, 
man or woman that should but deal with a tobacco-pipe ; 
why, it will stifle them all in the end, as many as use it; it's 
little better than rats-bane or rosaker.' " * 

From the first announcement that English navigators had 
discovered tobacco in Virginia, until the London and Ply- 
mouth companies sailed for the New "World, the deepest 
interest was taken in the voyagers. Drayton, the poet, wrote 
of "The Yirginian Voyage," while Chapman and other 
dramatists wrote plays in which allusions were made to Vir- 
ginia. In the " Mask of Flowers," performed at White HaU 

* A preparation of arsenic. 



TOBACCO ON THE STAGE. 93 

upon Twelfth Night, 1613-14, one of the characters chal- 
lenges another, and asserts that wine is more worthy than 
tobacco. The costnmes were exceedingly grotesque and 
suggestive of the New rather than of the Old World. Kawosha 
one of the principal characters rode in, wearing on his head 
a cap of red-cloth of gold, from his ears were pendants, a 
glass chain was about his neck, his body and legs were 
covered with olive-colored stuff, in his hands were a bow and 
arrows, and the bases of tobacco - colored stuff cut like 
tobacco leaves. The play abounds with allusions to the 
" Indian weed." 

" Silenus.— Kawosha comes in majestic, 
Was never such a God as he ; 
He's come from a far countrie 
To make our nose a chimney. 

Kateosha. — The wine takes the contrary way 
To get into the hood ; 
But good tobacco makes no stay 
But seizeth where it should. 
More incense hath burned at 
Great Kawoshae's foote 
Than to Silen and Bacchus, both, 
And take in Jove to boote. 

Silenus. — The worthies they were nine tis true, 
And lately Arthur's knights I knew ; 
But now are come up Worthies new, 
The roaring boys Kawoshae's crew. 

Kawosha. — Silenus toppes the barrel, but 
Tobacco toppes the braine 
And makes the vapors fire and soote. 
That mon revise againe. 
Nothing but fumigation 
Doth charm away ill sprites, 
Kawosha and his nation 
Found out these holy rites. " 

The writers of this period abound in allusions to tobacco 
and its use. The poets and dramatists found in it a fertile 
field for the display of their satire, and from 1600 to 1650 
Btage plays introduced many characters as either tobacco 



94 SHAKESPEARE ON TOBACCO. 

drinkers or sellers. It had now become so great a custom 
and had increased so fast after the importation of Virginia 
tobacco that it aiforded them no insignificant theme for the 
display of their genius.* The plajs of Jonson, Decker, 
Eowland, Heywood, Middleton, Fields, Fletcher, Hutton, 
Lodge, Sharpham, Marston, Lilly (court poet to Elizabeth), 
the Duke of Newcastle and others are full of allusions to 
the plant and those who indulged in its use. Shakespeare,t 
however, does not once allude to its use, and his silence on 
this then curious custom has provoked much conjecture and 
inquiry. Some affirm that he wrote to please royalty, but if 
so why did he not condemn the custom to appease the wrath 
of a sapient king. Others say he kept silence because he 
was the friend of Raleigh, and though he woiiid have gladly 
held up the great smoker and his favorite indulgence, feared 
to add to the popularity of the custom by displeasing his 
royal master. Another class affirm that as the stories of his 
plays are all antecedent to his own time, therefore he never 
mentions either the drinking of tobacco, or the tumultuous 
scenes of the ordinary which belonged to it, and which are 
so constantly met with in his contemporary dramatists. Says 
one: 

" How is it that our great dramatist never once makes 
even the slightest allusion to smoking ? "Who can suggest a 
reason ? Our great poet knew the human heart too well, and 
kept too steadily in view, the universal nature of man to be 
afraid of painting the external trapping and ephemeral 
customs of his own time. Does he not delight to moralize 
on false hair, masks, rapiers, pomandens, perfumes, dice, 
bowls, fardingales, etc? Did he not sketch for us, with 
enjoyment and with satire, too, the fantastic fops, the pomp- 
ous stewards, the mischievous paires, the quarrelsome revellers, 
the testy gaolers, tlie rhapsodizing lovers, the sly cheats, and 
the ruffling courtiers that tilled the streets of Elizabethan 
London, persons who could have been found nowhere else 

• "Never dirt natiireprorlnce n Plnnt thnt in a short. Timo became so universally use'l, for It 
■was but a short while Iviiowii in Europe, till it wiin taki'ii almost everywhere, either chewed; 
smoked, or snuffed. A |)ip(! of ti>i):i(ci> is now tlio general aud most frequent cumpauiunoi, 
Mug. Bottle, or Punch buwl."— 7. Shurt. 

+ Gifford has also remarkid that Sliakspean^ is the only one of the dramatic writers of the 
age of .laupHs who does not cuiMlesci'inl to notice tobacco ; all the others abound in allusions 
to it. Ill .loiison wi' Hiid t()l>acco in eviiy iilace— iu (li.b the waterman's house, and in iho 
Apollo Clul>rooin. on the stag.', and at the ordinary. The world of London waa then divldeu 
iutu two classes— the tobuccu-lovcrs aud the tobacco-haters. 



SMOKING TAUGHT. 95 

nor in any other age? No one can dispute that he drew the 
life that he saw moving around him. He sketched these 
creatures because they were before his eyes and were his 
enemies or his associates ; they live still because their creator's 
genius was Promethean, and endowed them with immytality. 
Bardolph, Moth, Slender, Abhorson, Don Armado, Mercutio, 
etc., are portraits, as everyone knows and feels who is con- 
versant with the manners of the Elizabethan times as 
handed down in old plays. 

"If Shakespeare's contemporaries were silent about the 
then new fashion of smoking, we should not so much wonder 
at Shakespeare's taciturnity. But Decker's and Ben Jon- 
son's works abound in allusions to tobacco, its uses and 
abuses. The humorist and satirist lost no opportunity of 
deriding the new fashion and its followers. The tobacco 
merchant was an important person in London of James the 
First's time — with his Winchester pipes, his maple cutting- 
blocks, his juniper- wood charcoal fires, and his silver tongs 
with which to hand the hot charcoal to his customers, 
although he was shrewdly suspected of adulterating the 
precious weed with sack lees and oil. It was his custom to 
wash the tobacco in muscadel and grains, and to keep it 
moist by wrapping it in greased leather and oiled rags, or by 
burying it in gravel. The Elizabethan pipes were so small 
that now when they are dug up in Ireland the poor call them 
' fairy pipes ' from their tininess. These pipes became known 
by the nickname of ' the woodcock's heads.' The apotheca- 
ries, who sold the best tobacco, became masters of the art, 
and received pupils, whom they taught to exhale the smoke 
in. little globes, rings, or the ' Euripus.' 'The slights' these 
tricks were called. Ben Jonson facetiously makes these 
professors boast of being able to take three whiffs, then to 
take horse, and evolve the smoke — one whiff on Hounslow, a 
second at Staines, and a third at Bagshot. 

"The ordinary gallant, like Mercutio, would smoke while 
the dinner was serving up. Those who were rich and 
foolish carried with them smoking apparatus of gold or 
eilver — tobacco-box, snuff-ladle, tongs to take up charcoal, and 
priming irons. There seems, from Decker's ' Gull's Horn- 
Book," to have been smoking clubs, or tobacco ordinaries as 
they were called, where the entire talk was of the best shops 
for buying Trinidado, the Nicotine, the Cane, and the Pud- 
ding, whose pipe had the best bore, which would turn 
blackest, and which would break in the browning. At the 
theatres, the rakes and spendthrifts who, crowded the stage 



96 BEN JONSON ON THE "WEED." 

of Shakespeare's time sat on low stools smoking; they sat 
with their three sorts of tobacco beside them, and handed 
each other lights on the points of their swords, sending out 
their pages for more Trinidado if they required it. Many 
gallants ' took ' their tobacco in the lords room over the stage, 
and went out to (Saint) Paul's to spit tliere privately. 
Shabby sponges and lying adventurers, like Bobadil, bragged 
of the number of packets of ' the most divine tobacco ' they 
had smoked in a week, and told enormous lies of living 
for weeks in the Indies on the fumes alone. They affirmed 
it was an antidote to all poison ; that it expelled rheums, sour 
humours, and obstructions of all kinds. Some doctors were 
of opinion that it would heal gout* and the ague, neutralise 
the effects of drunkenness, and remove weariness and hunger. 
The poor on the other hand, not disinclined to be envious 
and detracting when judging rich men's actions, laughed at 
men who made chimneys of their throats, or who sealed up 
their noses with snuff. 

" Ben Jonson makes that dry, shrewd, water carrier of his, 
Cob, rail at the ' roguish tobacco :' he would leave the stocks 
for worse men, and make it present whipping for either man 
or woman who dealt with a tobacco-pipe. But King James, 
in his inane 'Counterblast,' is more violent than even Cob. 
He argues that to use this unsavory smoke is to be guilty of 
a worse sin than that of drunkenness, and asks how men, who 
cannot go a day's journey without sending for hot coals to 
kindle their tobacco, can be expected to endure the privations 
of war. Smoking, the angry and fuming king protests, had 
made our manners as rude as those of the fish-wives of 
Dieppe. Smokers, tossing pipes and puffing smoke over the 
dinner-table, forgot all cleanliness and modesty. Men now, 
he says, cannot welcome a friend but straight they must be 
in hand with tobacco. He that refused a pipe in company 
was accounted peevish and unsociable. ' Yea,' says the royal 
coxcomb and pedant, ' the mistress cannot in a more mannerly 
kind entertain her servant than by giving him out of her fair 
hand a pipe of tobacco.' The royal reformer (not the most 
virtuous or cleanly of men) closes his denunciation with this 
tremendous broadside of invective : 

'Have you not reason, then' he says, 'to be shamed and 
to forbear this filthy novelty, so basely grounded, so foolishly 
received, and so grossly mistaken in the right use thereof? 

•"Some hold It for a singular remedle against the gowte (goat), to chaw everymornlne 
the leaves of Petum (tobacco), because it voideth great quantltie of flegme out at the 
mouth, hindering the same from falling upon the joints, which is the very cause of the 
gowte." Dr. Richard Swjlet (1606). 



CURATIVE QUALITIES. 



97 



To your abuse thereof sinning against God, harming yourself 
both in persons and goods, and taking also thereby the notes 
and marks of vanity upon you by the custom thereof, making 
yourselves to be wondered at by all, foreign civil nations and 
by all strangers that come among you, and be scorned, and 
contemned ; a custom both fulsome to the eye, hateful to the 
nose, harmful to the brain, dangerous to the lungs, and in the 
black stinking fume thereof nearest resembling the horrible 
Stigian smelle of the pit that is bottomless." 

The supposed curative virtues of the tobacco plant had 
much to do with its use in Europe while the singular mode 
of exhaling through the nostrils added to its charms, and 




EXHALING THROUGH THE NOSE. 

doubtless led to far greater indulgence. Spenser in his Fairy 
Queen makes one of the characters include it with other 
herbs celebrated for medicinal qualities. 

" Into the woods thence-forth in haste she went, 
To seek for lierbes that mote him remedy ; 
For she of herbes had great intendiment, 
Taught of the Nympli wliich from her infancy, 
Had nursed her in true nobility : 
There whether it divine Tobacco were, 
Or Panachse, or Polygony, 
She found and brought it to her patient deare, 
Who all this while lay bleeding out his heart-blood neare." 

7 



98 MODES OF USE. 

Lilly also a little later, in his play of The "Woman in the 
Moone (1597(, speaks of it (through one of the characters) as 
being a medicinal herb — 

" Gather me balme and cooling violets 
And of our holy herbe nicotian, 
And bring withall pure honey from the hive 
To heale the wound of my unhappy hand." 

Barclay, in his tract on " The Yertues of Tobacco," recom- 
mends its use as a medicine. The following is one of the 
modes of use : 

" Take of leafe Tobacco as much as, being folded together, 
may make a round ball of such bignesse that it may iill the 
patient's mouth, and inclyne his face downwards toward the 
ground, keeping the mouth open, not mouthing any whit 
with his tongue, except now and then to waken the medica- 
ment, there shall flow such a flood of water from his brain 
and his stomacke, and from all the parts of his body that it 
shall be a wonder. This must he do fasting in the morning, 
and if it be for preservation, and the body be very caco- 
chyme, or full of evil humors, he must take it once a week, 
otherwise once a month. He gives the plant the name of 
'Nepenthes,' and says of it, that 'it is worthy of a more 
loftie name.' " He writes the following verse addressed to: 

" The Abusers of Tobacco." 

*' Why do you thus abuse this heavenly plant, 
The hope of health, the fuel of our life ? 
Why do you waste it without fear of want, 
Since fine and true tobacco is not ryfe ? 
Old Enclio won't foul water for to spair, 
And stop the bellows not to waste the air." 

He also alludes to the quality of tobacco and says: "The 
finest Tobacco is that which pearceth quickly the odorat with 
a sharp aromaticke smell, and tickleth the tongue with acri- 
monie, not unpleasant to the taste, from whence that which 
draweth most water is most veituous, whether the substance 
of it be chewed in the mouth, or the smoke of it received." 

He speaks of the countries in which the plant grows, and 
prefers the tobacco grown in the New World as being supe- 
rior to that grown in the Old. In his opinion, " only that 



HELD UP TO RIDICULE. 99 

wliich is fostered in the Indies, and brought home by 
Manners and Traffiqners, is to be used." But not alone 
were Poets and Dramatists inspired to sing in praise or dis- 
praise of tobacco, Physicians and others helped to swell in 
broadsides, pamphlets and chap-books, the loudest praises or 
the most bitter denunciation of the weed. Taylor, tlie water 
poet, who lost his occupation as bargeman when the coach 
came into use, thought that the devil brought tobacco into 
England in a coach. One of the first tracts wholly devoted 
to tobacco is entitled Nash's " Lenten Stuffe." The work is 
dedicated to Humphrey King, a tobacconist, and is full of 
curious sayings in regard to the plant. Another work, 
er. titled "Metamorphosis of Tobacco," and supposed to have 
been written by Beaumont, made its appearance about this 
time. Samuel Rowlands, the dramatist, wrote two works on 
tobacco ; the first is entitled " Look to it, for I'll Stabbe Ye," 
written in 1604; the other volume is a small quarto, bearing 
this singular title : " A whole crew of Kind Gossips, all met 
to be Merry." This is a satire on the time and manners of 
the period, and is written in a coarse style worthy of the 
author. In 1G05 there appeared a little volume bearing for 
its title, "Laugh and Lie Down, or the World's Folly." 
This work describes the fops and men of fashion of its time, 
and shows how popular the custom of tobacco taking had 
become. In 1609, in "The Gull's Home Book," a gallant is 
described as follows : 

" Before the meate comes smoaking to the board our Gal- 
lant must draw out his tobacco box, the ladle for the cold 
snuff into his nostrils, the tongs and the priming iron. All 
this artillery may be of gold or silver, if he can reach to the 
price of it; it will be a reasonable, useful pawn at all times 
when the current of his money falles out to rune low. And 
here you must observe to know in what state tobacco is in 
town, better than the merchants, and to discourse of the 
potecaries where it is to be sold as readily as the potecary 
himself." 

One of the severest tirades against tobacco appeared in 
1612, " The Curtain Drawer of the World." In speaking of 
the users of the weed, and especially noblemen, he says : 



100 TIRADES AGAINST TOBACCO. 

" Then noblemen's chimneys nsed to smoke, and not their 
noses ; Englishmen without were not Blackamoores within, 
for then Tobacco was an Indian, nnpickt -and unpiped, — now 
made the common ivy-bush of luxury, the curtaine of dis- 
honesty, the proclaimer of vauity, the drunken colourer of 
Drabby solacy." 

In the " Soule's Solace, or Thirty -and-One Spiritual 
Emblems," by Thomas Jenner, occurs the following verses : 

" Tlie Indian weed, withered quite, 
Greene at noone, cut down at night. 
Shows thy decay ; all flesh is hay ; 
Thus thinke, then drinke Tobacco. 

The Pipe that is so lily-white, 
Show thee to be a mortal wight, 
And even such, gone with a touch, 
Thus thinke, then drinke Tobacco. 

And when the smoake ascends on high, 
Thinke thou beholdst the vanity 
Of worldly stuffe, gone with a puffe. 
Thus thinke, then drinke Tobacco. 

And when the Pipe grows foul within, 
Thinke on thy soul defiled with sin. 
And then the fire it doth require ; 
Thus thinke, then drinke Tobacco. 

The ashes that are left behind. 
May serve to put thee still in mind. 
That unto dust return thou must ; 
Thus thinke, then drinke Tobacco." 

Buttes, in a little volume entitled " Dyets Dry Dinner," 
(1599) says that " Tobacco was translated out of India in the 
seede or roote ; native or sative in our own fruitfullest soils. 
It cureth any griefe, dolour, imposture, or obstruction pro- 
ceeding of colde or winde, especially in the head or breast. 
The fume taken in a pipe is good against Rumes, ache in the 
bead, stomacke, lungs, breast ; also in want of meate, drinke, 
sleepe, or rest." 

The introduction of tobacco from the colony of Virginia 
was followed soon after by a reduction of price that led to 
more frequent use among the poorer classes, such as grooms 



ALE AND TOBACCO. 101 

and hangers on at taverns and ale-houses, who are aUuded to 
in Rich's " Honestie of this Age : 

" There is not so base a groome that comes into an ale- 
house to call for his pott, but he must have his pipe of 
tobacco ; for it is a commodity that is nowe as vendible in 
every tavern, wine and ale-house, as eyther wine, ale or beare ; 




OLD LONDON ALE-HOUSE. 



and for apothecaerie's shops, grocer's shops, chandler's shops, 
they are never without company, that from morning till 
night, are still taking of tobacco. What a number are there 
besides, that doe keepe houses, set open shoppes, that have 
no other trade to live by, but by selling of tobacco. I have 
heard it told, that now very lately there hath been a cata- 
logue of all those new erected houses that have sett up that 
.trade of selling tobacco in London, and neare about London ; 
and if a man may believe, what is confidently reported, there 
are found to be upwards of seven thousand of houses that 
doth live by that trade. 

" If it be true that there be seven thousand shops in and 
about London, that doth vend tobacco, as it is credibly 
reported that there be over and above that number, it may 
well be supposed to be but an ill customed shop, that taketh 
not five shillings a day, one day with another throughout the 
whole year ; or, if one doth take lesse, two other may take 
more ; but let us make our account, but after two shillings 
sixpence a day, for he that taketh lesse than that would be 
ill able to pay his rent, or to keepe open his shop windows ; 
neither would tobacco houses make such a muster as they do, 
and that almost in every lane, and in every by-corner round 
about London." 

" A Tobacco seller is described after this manner by 



X02 TOBACCO SELLIKG. 

Blount in a volume "Micro-Cosmograpliie; Or A Piece of 
of the "World discovered; in Essays and Characters" (162S). 

" A tobacco seller is the only man that iinds good in it 
■which others brag of, but doe not, for it is meate, drinke, and 
clothes to him. No man opens his ware with greater serious- 
ness, or challenges your judgment more in the operation. His 
Shop is the Randenvous of spitting, where men dialogue with 
their noses, and their conversation is smoke. It is the place 
only where Spain is commended, and preferred before Eng- 
land itself. 

" He should be "well experienced in the World ; for he has 
daily tryall as men's nostrils, and none is better acquainted 
with humour. His is the piecing commonly of some other 
trade, which is bawd to his Tobacco, and that to his wife, 
which is the flame that follows the smoke." 

Early in the Seventeenth Century began the persecution by 
r royal haters of the plant, others, however, had denounced 
« the weed and its use and users, but venting nothing more 

\ than a tirade of words against it, had but little effect in 
breaking up the trade or the custom.* James I. sent forth 
his famous "Counterblast" and in the strongest manner con- 
demned its use. A portion of it reads thus : 

" Surely smoke becomes a kitchen fane better than a dining 
chamber : and yet it makes a kitchen oftentimes in the 
inward parts of men, soyling and injecting with an unctuous 
oyly kind of roote as hath been found in some great tobacco 
takers, that after death were opened. A custom loathsome 
to the eye, harmful to the braine, dangerous to the lungs, and 
the black stinking fume thereof, nearest resembling the 
horrible Stygian smoke of the pit that is bottomless." f 

Quaint old Burton in his "Anatomy of Melancholy," 
recognizes the virtues of the plant while he anathematizes its 
abuse. He says : — 

" Tobacco, divine, rare, superexcellent tobacco, which goes 
far beyond all their panacetas, potable gold, and philosophers* 
stones, a soveraign remedy to all diseases. A good vomit, I 

•ElizabPth during her ml^n, pnhllRtied nn Pdlct aeafnst Us use, assigning as a reason, 
that li' r subjects, by employing the same luxuries as barbarians, were likely to degenerate 
Into barbaribin. 

"From tlie first introduction of the weed, the votar'es of the pipe have enjoyed all the 
blesRings of pcrKCfulion. Kings hiive punished, priests have anatl)<'niat(7('<l, satirists 
satirized ami women scolded ; hut still tlie weed, wttli its divers shapes and different names, 
reigns supreme among narcotics in every region of the giobe.''— £'«J€rwn'\ Magazine. 

t Anotlier writer in the siime censorious manner says of the use of tobacco. "Smoklnff 
is the Jovial repast of Cannibals or Man-eaters, and the grand entertainment of idcdatrous 
Pagan Festivnls. Masters will not permit the use of It to their survuutB or elaves and suctt 
as use It cau hurdl; ilnd uiasters or buyers." 



TOBACCO IN EUROPE. 103 

confesse, a vertuous lierb, if it be well qualified, opportunely 
taken, and medicinally used ; but, as it is commonly abused 
by most men, which take it as tinkers do ale, 'tis a plague, a 
mischief, a violent piirger of goods, lands, health, hellish, 
divclish and damned tobacco, the ruine and overthrow of 
body and soul." 

The duty on importation liad been only twopence per 
pound, a moderate sum in view of the prices realized by the 
sale of it. 

The King now increased it to the enormous sum of two 
shilling and ten pence. James termed the custom of using 
tobacco an "evil vanitie" impairing " the health of a great 
number of people their bodies weakened and made unfit for 
labor, and the estates of many mean persons so decayed and 
consumed, as they are thereby driven to unthriftie shifts 
only to maintain their gluttonous exercise thereof." * Brodi- 
gan says of the " Counterblast : " 

" However absurd his reasoning may appear, it unfortu- 
nately happened that he possessed the power to reduce his 
aversion to practice, and he may be considered as the author 
of that unwarrantable persecution of the tobacco plant, which 
under varying circumstances, has been injudiciously continued 
to the present time." 

Other royal haters of the plant issued the most strenous 
lawsf and affixed penalties of the severest kind, of these may 
be mentioned the King of Persia, Amuroth IV. of Turkey, 
the Emperor Jehan-Gee and Popes Urban VIII. and 
Innocent XII., the last of whom sho'ved his dislike to many 
other customs beside that of tobacco taking. 

One of the edicts which he issued was against the taking 

of snuff in St. Peters, at Rome ; this was in 1690 ; it was, 

however, revoked by Pope Benedict XIV., who himself had 

acquired the indulgence. 

/ Early in the Seventeenth Century tobacco found its way to 

r Constantinople. To punish the habit, a Turk was seized and 

^ a pipe transfixed through his nose. 

•"Kinpr Jamos* violont prcjudiors against nil nso of tobacco nroRC from Ills nvcrslon to 
Blr Walter KulciKh. i.'s lirst Importer iuto England whom ho intundcd a eacriCcu to tlic grat- 
IQcatinn of the KIkr of Spain." 

t Tho Ein(>r('Rn Kliz/ibctU was IfRu ocvcro. Sho decreed that the pnuff-hoxcBOf those who 
•nadc use of them iu church should be conflscutud lo the use of the beadle. 



ROYAL HATERS OF TOBACCO. 105 

The death of King James, followed by its occupancy of 
the throne by his son Charles I., 3id not lessen the persecu- 
tion against tobacco.* In 1625, the year of his accession, he 
issued a proclamation against all tobaccos excepting only the 
growth of Virginia and Somerites. Charles II. also prohib- 
ited the cultivation of tobacco in England and Ireland, 
attaching a penalty of 10£ per rood. Fairholt, in alhiding 
to the Stuarts and Cromwell as persecutors of tobacco, says: 

" Cromwell disliked the plant, and ordered his troops to 
trample down the crop wherever found." 

It is an historical fact that both James I. and the two 
Charleses as well as Cromwell had the strongest dislike against 
the Indian weed. 

With such powerful foes it seems hardly possible that the 
custom should have increased to such an extent that when 
William ascended the throne the custom was said to be 
almost universal.f "Pipes grew larger and ruled by a 
Dutchman, all England smoked in peace." From this time 
forward the varieties used served only to increase the demand 
for the tobacco of the colonies, and as its culture became 
better understood the leaf grew in favor, until the demand 
for it was greater than the production. 

During the reign of Anne, the custom of smoking appears 
to have attained its greatest height in England ; the consump- 
tion of tobacco was then proportion ably greater, considering 
the population, than it is at the present time. Spooner, in 
his " Looking-Glass for Smokers," 1703, says of the custom : 

" The sin of the kingdom in the intemperate use of tobacco, 
swellcth and increaseth so daily, that I can compare it to 
nothing but the waters of Noah, that swell'd fifteen cubits 
above the highest mountains. So that if this practice shall 
continue to increase as it doth, in an age or two it will be as 
hard to find a family free, as it was so long time since one 
that commonly took it." 



*Tobacco has been able to survive such attncks as those— tiny, has raised up a host of 
defenders !i8 well as opponents. The Polish Jesuits published a work entitled " Anti-Miso- 
capiius," in answer to Kinfr James. In 1628, Raphael Thorius wrote a pnein "Hymuus 
Tob;ici." A host of nnnios appear in the Held: Lesus, Brauiii and Simon Pauli, Portal, Pia, 
Vanqnelin, Gardaane, Pcisselt. Reimann, and De Morveau. 

tsays an enthusiastic writer on tobacco, " Jf judged by the vicissitudes through which it 
has traveled, it must indeed be acknowledged a hero among filants; and if liuman pity, 
respect, or love should be given it for ' the dangers it has passed,' the inspiration of Desde- 
jnonia's love for Othello, then might its most eloquent opponent be dumb, or yield it no 
tnconsiderable meed of homage." 



106 



OLD CUSTOMS. 



When tobacco was first introduced into England its sale 
was confined to apothecaries, but afterwards it was dealt in 
by tobacconists, who sold other goods besides tobacco. 

About the middle of the Seventeenth Century the 
culture of tobacco commenced in England ; it continued, 
however, only for a short time, for the rump parliament in 
1652 prohibited the planting of it, and two years later Crom- 
well and his council appointed commissioners for strictly 
putting this act in execution : and in 1660 it was legally 
enacted, that from the first of January, 1660-1, no person 
whatever should sow or plant any tobacco in England, under 
certain penalties. 

In England drinking or smoking tobacco seems to have 
met with more success (as a mode of use) rather than 
chewing (now so popular). It was principally confined to 
the lower classes, and was common among soldiers and sailors. 




SILVER SPITTOONS. 



When used by gentlemen it was common to carry a silver 
basin to spit in. 

The habit of smoking or using tobacco in any form was 

\ 



A RACY POEM. 107 

then more constant than now, and its use was common in 
almost all places of public gathering. It was the custom to 
smoke in theatres ; stools being provided for those who paid 
for their use and the privilege of smoking on the stage. 
Tobacco was also sold at some of the play-houses, and proved 
a source of profit, doubtless, beyond even the representation 
of the plays. "VYe should infer also from some of the early 
stage plays, that the " players " used the weed even when 
acting their parts. Rowlands gives the following poem on 
tobacco in his " Knave of Clubs," 1611 : — 

" Who durst dispraise tobacco whilst the smoke is in my nose, 

Or say, but fah ! my pipe doth smell, I would I knew but those 

Durst offer such indignity to that which I prefer. 

For all the brood of blackamoors will swear I do not err, 

In taking this same worthy whif with valiant cavalier, 

But that will make his nostrils smoke, at cupps of wine or beer. 

When as my purse can not afford my stomach flesh or fish, 

I sop with smoke, and feed as well and fat as one can wish. 

Come into any company, though not a cross you have, 

Yet offer them tobacco, and their liquor you shall have. 

They say old hospitalitie kept chimnies smoking still ; 

Now what your chimnies want of that, our smoking noses will. 

Much vituals serves for gluttony, to fatten men like swine, 

But he's a frugal man indeed that with a leaf can dine. 

And needs no napkins for his hands, his fingers' ends to wipe. 

But keeps his kitchen in a box, and roast meat in a pipe. 

This is the way to help down years, a meal a day's enough : 

Take out tobacco for the rest, by pipe, or else by snuff. 

And you shall find it physical ; a corpulent, fat man. 

Within a year shall shrink so small that one his guts shall span. 

It's full of physic's rare effects, itworketh sundry ways, 

The leaf green, dried, steept, burnt to dust, have each their several praise, 

It makes some sober that are drunk, some drunk of sober sense, 

And all the moisture hurts the brain, it fetches smoking thence. 

All the four elements unite when you tobacco take. 

For earth and water, air and fire, do a conjunction make. 

The pipe is earth, the fire's therein, the air the breathing smoke; 

Good liquor must be present too, for fear I chance to choke. 

Here, gentlemen, a health to all, 'Tis passing good and strong. 

I would speak more, but^br the pipe I cannot stay so long. 

In 1602 appeared a sweeping tirade entitled, " Work for 
Chimney Sweepers, or a Warning against Tobacconists." It 



108 



GOOD RECOMMENDATIONS. 



@<? 



abounds with threats against all who indulge in tobacco. 

The most singular work, how- 
ever, appeared in 1616, bearing 
the following singular title: 
" The Smoking Age, or the Man 
in the Mist ; with the Life and 
Death of Tobacco. Dedicated 
to Captain Whiife, Captain Pipe, 
and Captain Snuffe." A frontis- 
piece is given representing a 
tobacconist's shop with shelves, 
counters, pipes and tobacco ; a 
' carved figure of a negro stands 
npon the counter, which shows 
how soon such figures were used 
by dealers in pipes and tobacco. 

The title-page contains the following epigram : 




" This some affirme, yet yield I not to that, 
'Twill malie a fat man lean, a lean man fat; 
But this I'm sure (howse'ere it be they meane) 
That many whiffes will make a fat man lean." 

The following effusion resembles many of the verees of 
the day on the fruitful subject : 

" Tobacco's an outlandish weed. 
Doth in the land strange wonders breed. 
It taints the breath, the blood it dries, 
It burns the head, it blinds the eyes ; 
It dries the lungs, scourgeth the lights, 
It numbs the soul, it dulls the sprites; 
I brings a man into a maze. 
And makes him sit for other's gaze ; 
It makes a man, it mars a purse, 
A lean one fat, a fat one worse ; 
A sound man sick, a sick man sound, 
A bound man loose, a loose man bound; 
A white man black, a black man white, 
A night a day, a day a night; 
The wise a fool, the foolish wise, 
A sober man in drunkard's guise ; 



LESSONS TAUGHT US. 109 

A drunkard with a drought or twain, 

A soher man it makes again ; 

A full man empty, and an empty full, 

A gentleman a foolish gull ; 

It turns the brain like cat in pan, 

And makes a Jack a gentleman." 

The well-known song of " Tobacco is an Indian Weed," 
was written most probably the last half of the Seventeenth 
Century, Fairholt gives the best copy we have seen of it. 
It is taken from the first volume of " Pills to Purge Melan- 
choly," and reads thus : 

*' Tobacco's but an Indian weed, 

Grows green at morn, cut down at eve. 
It shows our decay, we are but clay ; 
Think of this when you smoke tobacco. 

" The pipe, that is so lily white. 
Wherein so many take deliglit. 
Is broke with a touch — man's life is such ; 
Think of this when you smoke tobacco. 

*' The pipe, that is so foul within. 

Shews how man's soul is stained with sin, 
And then the fire it doth require ; 
Think of this when you smoke tobacco. 

*• The ashes that are left behind 
Do serve to put us all in mind 
That unto dust return we must ; 
Think of this when you smoke tobacco. 

" The smoke, that does so high ascend. 
Shews us man's life must have an end. 
The Vapor's gone — man's life is done ; 
Think of this when you smoke tobacco." 

One of the strongest objections against the use of the 
" Indian novelty " was its ruinous cost at this period. During 
the reign of James The First and Charles The Second, 
Spanish tobacco sold at from ten to eighteen shillings per 
pound while Virginia tobacco sold for a time for three 
shillings. In no age and by no race excepting perhaps the 
Indians was the habit so universal or carried to such a length 



no A SMOKING DIVINE. 

as in the Seventeentli Century — its supposed virtues as a 
medicine induced many to inhale the smoke constantly. 
This was one reason why tobacco was condemned by so 
many of the writers and playwrights of the day yet many 
of them used the weed in some form from Ben Johnson to 
Gibber the one fond of his pipe the other of his snuff. 

In 1639 Venner published a volume entitled " A Treatise " 
concerning the taking of the fume of tobacco. His advice 
is " to take it moderately and at fixed times." Many of the 
clergy were devoted adherents of the pipe. Lilly says of its 
use among them : 

" In this year Bredon vicar of Thornton a profound divine, 
but absolutely the most polite person for nativities in that 
age, strictly adhering to Ptolemy, which he well understood ; 
he had a hand in composing Sir Christopher Heydon's 
defence of judicial astrology, being that time his chaplain ; he 
was so given over to tobacco and drink, that when he had no 
tobacco, he would cut the bell-ropes and smoke them." 




CHAPTER V. 

TOBACCO IN EUKOPE. (CONTINUED.) 

• EANDER in his work " Tobacologia," (1622) gives 
a list of the various kinds of tobacco then used and 
where they were cultivated, among them are the 
following well known now as standard varieties of 
tobacco: Brazilian, St. Domingo, Orinoco, Virginia, and 
Trinidad tobacco. Fairholt says of the latter that it was 
most popular in England and is frequently named by early 
authors.* Tobacco when prepared for us was made into 
long rolls or large balls which often answered for the 
tobacconist's sign. What we now call cut tobacco was not 
as popular then as roll. Smokers carried a roll of tobacco, 
a knife and tinder to ignite their tobacco. At the close of 
the Sixteenth Century tobacco was introduced into the East. -^ 
In Persia and Turkey where at first its use was opposed by "^ 
the most cruel torture it gained at length the sanction and J 
approval of even the Sultan himself. Pallas gives the fol- "^ 
lowing account in regard to its first introduction into Asia: ^V- 

" In Asia, and especially in China, the use of tobacco for \ 
emoking is more ancient than the discovery of the New J 
"World, 1 too scarcely entertain a doubt. Among the Chinese, s 
and among the Mongol tribes who had the most intercourse x 
with them, the custom of smoking is so general, so frequent, ♦ x 
and become so indispensable a luxury; the tobacco purse * <' 
afiixed to their belt, so necessary an article of dress; the ^ 
form of the pipes from which the Dutch seem to have taken 
the model of theirs so original : and, lastly the preparation of :;^ 
the yellow leaves, which are merely rubbed to pieces and 

* Ncander aays that Varlnai tobacco was tlie best. 

Ill 



112 



POPULAR USE OF TOBACCO. 



then put into the pipe, so peculiar, that we cannot possibly 
derive all this from America by way of Europe ; especinlly 
as India, (where the habit of smoking is not so general,) inter- 
venes between Persia and China. May we not expect to tind 
traces of this custom in the first account of the Voyages of 
the Portugese and Dutch to China ? To investigate this 
subject, I have indeed the inclination but not sufficient 
leisure." 

'We find by research that smoking was the most general 
mode of using tobacco in England when first introduced. 
In France the habit of snuffing was the most popular mode 

and to this day the cus- 
tom is more general 
than elsewhere. In the 
days of the Regency 
snuff-taking had attained 
more general popularity 
than any other mode of 
using the plant leaves; 
the clergy were fond of 
the " dust " and carried 
the most expensive snuff 
boxes, while many loved 
the pipe and indulged in 
tobacco-smoking. The 
old vicar restored to his living enjoyed a pipe when seated 
in his chair musing on the subject of his next Sunday's dis- 
course, " with a jug of sound old ale and a huge tome of 
sound old divinity on the table before him, for the occasional 
refreshment as well of the bodily as the spiritual man." 

The cultivation of tobacco in Europe was begun in Spain 
and Portugal. Its culture in these kingdoms as well as by 
their colonies brought to the crown enormous revenues. In 
1626, its culture began in France and is still an important 
product. A little later it began to be cultivated in Germany 
where it had already been used as a favorite luxury. From 
this time its use and cultivation extended to various parts of 
Europe. The Persecutors whether kings, popes, poets, or 
courtiers at length gave up their opposition while many of 




TOBACCO AND THEOLOGY. 



MORE POETRY II3 

them joined in the use and spread of the custom. It has 
been said with much truth : 

"History proves that persecution never triumphs in its 
attempted eradications. Tobacco was so generally liked that 
no legislative measures could prevent its use." 

At first the use of tobacco was confined to fops and the 
hangers on at ale houses and taverns but afterwards by the 
"chief men of the realm." Soon after the importation of 
the "durned weed" from Virginia the tobacco muse gave 
forth many a lay concerning the custom. The following 
verses describe the method of smoking then in vogue: 

Nor did that time know- 
To puff and to blow- 
In a peece of white clay. 
As they do at this day 
With fier and coole, 
And a leafe in a hole ; 
As my ghost hath late seen, 
As I walked betwene 
Westminister Hall 
And the church of St. Paul, 
And so thorow the citie 
Where I saw and did pitty 
My country men's cases, 
With fiery-smoke faces, 
Sucking and drinking 
A filthie weede stinking, 
Was ne'r known before 
Till the devil and the More 
In th' Indies did meete. 
And each other there greete V 

With a health they desire. 

Of stinke, smoke and fier. ; 

But who e're doth abhorre it. ' 

The citie smookes for it ; 
Now full of fier shop, 
And fowle spitttng chop. 
So sneezing and coughing. 

That my ghost fell to scofl^g. \ 

And to myself said : 
Here's filthie fumes made ; 
Good phisicke oi force 
' To cure a sicke horse." 



3.14: FROM "OLD SALT." 

The Puritans, from the first introduction of the plant, 
were sincere haters of tobacco, not only in England but in 
America. Cromwell had as strong a dislike of the plant as 
King James, and ordered the troopers to destroy the crops 
by trampling them under foot. Hutton describes a Puritan 
as one who 

"Abhors a sattin suit, a velvet cloak, 
And sayes tobacco is the Devill's smoke." 

Probably no other plant has ever met with such powerful 
determined opposition, both against its use and cultivation, 
as the tobacco plant. It was strenuously opposed by all 
possible means, governmental, legislative, and literary. When 
tea and coffee were first introduced both were denounced in 
unmeasured terms, but the opposition was not so bitter or as 
lasting. 

The following verses bearing the nom de plume of an " Old 
Salt," record much of the history of the plant : — 

" Oh muse ! grant me the power 
(I have the will) to sing 
How oft in lonely hour, 
When storms would round me lower, 
Tobacco's prov'd a King ! 

*' Philanthropists, no doubt 
With good intentions ripe, 
Their dogmas may put out, 
And arrogantly shout 
The evils of the pipe. 



/ 



■" Kind moralists, with tracts, 
Opinions fine may show : 
Produce a thousand facts- 
How ill tobacco acts 
Man's system to o'erthrow. 

*' Learn'd doctors have employed 
Much patience, time and skill, 
To prove tobacco cloyed 
With acrid alkaloid. 
With power the nervea to kill 

" E'en Popes have curst the plant; 
Kings bade its use to cease ; 



TOBACCO GLORIFIED. H5 

But all the Pontiff's rant 
And Royal Jamie's cant 
Ne'er made its use decrease. 

*' Teetotallers may stamp 
And roar at pipes and beer ; 
But place them in a swamp, 
WJien nights are dark and damp — 
Their tune would change, I fear. 

*' No advocate am I 
Of excess in one or t'other, 
And ne'er essayed to try 
In wine to drown a sigh. 
Or a single care to smother. 

*' Yet, in moderation pure, 
A glass is well enough ; 
But, a troubled heart to cure, 
Kind feelings to insure. 
Give me a cheerful puff. 

*' How oft a learn'd divine 
His sermons will prepare, 
Not by imbibing wine, 
But, 'neath th' influence fine 
Of a pipe of " baccy " rare ! 

*< How many a pleasing scene, 
How many a happy joke. 
How many a satire keen. 
Or problem sharp, has been 
Evolved or born of smoke ! 

*' How oft, amidst the jar 
Of storms on ruin bent, • 

On ship-board, near or far, 
To the drenched and shiv'ring tar 
Tobacco's solace lent ! 

*' Oh ! tell me not 'tis bad, 
Or that it shortens life. 
Its charms can soothe the sad, 
And make the wretched glad, 
In trouble and in strife. 

" 'Tis used in every clime, 
By all men, high and low; 
It is praised in prose and rhyme, 
So let the kind herb grow ! 



116 WEIGHT OF SMOKE. 

" 'Tis a friend to the distress'd, 
'Tis a comforter in need ; 
It is social, soothing, blest ; 
It has fragrance, force, and zest; 
Then hail the kingly weed !" 

While Raleigh * and many of Elizabeth's courtiers indulged 
frequently in a pipe, some have imagined that even Queen 
Bess herself tested the rare virtues of tobacco. This is 
hardly based upon sufficient proof to warrant a very strong 
belief in it ; but the following account of " How to weigh 
smoke " taken from Tinsleifs Magazine shows that the Queen 
was acquainted at least with Raleigh's use of the weed : 

" One day it happened that Queen Elizabeth, wandering 
about the grounds and alleys at Hampton with a single maid 
of honour, came upon Sir Walter Raleigh indulging in a 
pipe. Smoking now is as common as eating and drinking, 
and to smoke amongst ladies is a vulgarity. But not so then : 
it was an accomplishment, it was a distinction ; and one of 
the feathers in Sir Walter's towering cap was his introduction 
of tobacco. The all-accomplished hero rose and saluted the 
Queen in his grand manner, and the Queen, who was in her 
daintiest humour, gave him her white hand to kiss, and took 
the seat he had left. 

" E"ow, Sir Walter, I can puzzle you at last." " I suppose 
I must not be so rude as to doubt your Majesty." " You are 
bold enough for that, but your boldness will not help you. 
Sir Walter, this time. You cannot tell me how much the 
smoke from your pipe weighs." " Your Majesty is mistaken. 
I can tell you to a nicety. Will your Majesty allow me to 
call yonder page, and send for a pair of scales and weights ? '. 
" By my honour," said the Queen, " were any other subject 
in our realm to make request so absurd, we should very 
positively deny it. But you are the wisest of our fools, and, 
though we expect to see but little use made of these weights 
when brought, your request shall be granted. And, suppos- 
ing you fail to weigh the smoke, what penalty will you pay V 
" I will be content," said Sir Walter, " to lose my head.'^ 
" You may chance to lose it on a graver count than this ; " 
answered the Queen. " If the head shall have done some 



' It la said that Baleigh la communicating the art to his friends, gave smoking parties at 
his nouse, where his guests were treated with nothing but a pipe, a mug of ale, and a 
nutmeg Says an English writer : " From the anecdote related respecting the weight of 
smoke the vapor of the pipe certainly did not throw a cloud over the brilliant wit of the 
unfortunate Baleigh." 



FIRE ! FIRE ! 



11^ 




slight service to jonr Majesty and the realm," replied the 
courteous knight, " thee will be well content nevertheless." 

" But your Majesty will soon see that I fail not. First, 
madam, I place this empty pipe in the scales, and I find that 
it weighs exactly 2 ounces. I now fill it with tobacco, and 
the weight is in- 
creased to 2 1-1 0th 
ounce. I must now 
ask your Majesty to 
allow me to smoke 
the j)ipe out. I shall 
then turn out the 
ashes, and place them 
together with the 
pipe in the scale once 
more. The diifer- 
e n c e between the 
weight of the pipe 
with the unsmoked 
tobacco, and weight 
of the pipe with the 
ashes, will be the 
weight of the smoke." 
" You are too clever 
for us. Sir Walter. We shall expect you to-night at supper, 
and if the conversation grow dull, you shall tell our cour- 
tiers the story of the pipe." 

Many other anecdotes have been told of the adventures of 
Raleigh with his pipe. One is that while taking a quiet 
smoke his servant entered and becoming alarmed on seeing 
the smoke coming from his nose threw a mug of ale in his 
face. 

The same anecdote is also related of others including 
Tarlton. He gives an account of it in his Jests 1611. it is 
told in this manner : 

" Tarlton as other gentlemen used, at the first coming up 
of tobacco, did take it more for fashion's sake than otherwise, 
and being in a roome, sat betweene two men overcome with 
wine, and they never seeing the like, wondered at it, and 
seeing the vapour come out of Tarlton's nose, cryed out, 

* Fire, fire !' and threw a cup of wine in Tarlton's face, 

* Make no more stirre,' quoth Tarlton, ' the fire is quenched ; 
if the sheriflfs come, it will turne a fine as the custom is/ 



WEIGHING SMOKE. 



118 ANECDOTES. 

And drinking that againe, ' Fie,' says the other : ' what a 
stinke it makes. I am almost poysoned.' ' If it offend/ 
quoth Tarlton, ' let's every one take a little of the smell, and 
so the savor will qnickly go ;' but tobacco whiffes made them 
leave him to pay all." 

Rich gives the following account of a similar scene : — 
"I remember a pretty jest of tobacco which was this: A 
certain Welchman coming newly to London, and beholding 
one to take tobacco, never seeing the like before, and not 
knowing the manner of it, but perceiving him vent smoke 
so fast, and supposing his inward parts to be on fire, cried 
out, ' O Jhesu, Jliesu man, for the passion of Cod hold, for 
by Cod's splud ty snowt's on fire,' and having a bowle of 
beere in his hand, threw it at the other's face, to quench his 
smoking nose." 

The following anecdote is equally ludicrous. Before 
tobacco was much known in Germany, some soldiers belong- 
ing to a cavalry regiment were quartered in a German village* 
One of them, a trumpeter, happened to be a negro, A 
peasant, who had never seen a black man before, and wha 
knew nothing about tobacco, watched, though at a safe dis- 
tance, the trumpeter, while the latter groomed and fed his 
horse. As soon as this business was dispatched, the negro 
filled his pipe and began to smoke it. Great had been the 
peasant's bewilderment before; great was his terror now. 
The terror reached an intolerable point when the negro took 
the pipe from his mouth, offered it to the peasant, and asked 
him, in the best language he could command, to take a whifif. 
"ITo, no !" cried the peasant, in exceeding alarm; "no, no! 
Mr. Devil ; I do not wish to eat fire.'- 

Henry Fielding, in " The Grub Street Opera " written 
about a century ago, has the following verses on Tobacco : — 

" Let the learned talk ol books, 

The glutton of cooks, 
The lover of Celia's soft smack — O ! 

No mortal can boast 

So noble a toast, 
As a pipe of accepted tobacco. 

" Let the soldier for fame, 
And a general's name, 
In battle get many a thwack — 1 



MORE SONGS. 119 

i' 

Let who will have most 
Who will rule the rooste, 
Give me but a pipe of tobacco. 

" Tobacco gives wit 

To the dullest old cit, 
And makes him of politics crack — O ! 

The lawyers i' th' hall 

Were not able to bawl, 
Were it not for a whiff of tobacco. 

" The man whose chief glory 

Is telling a story, 
Had never arrived at the smack — O ! 

Between every heying, 

And as I was saying. 
Did he not take a whiff of tobacco. ' 

" The doctor who places 

Much skill in grimaces, 
And feels your pulse running tic tack — O ! 

Would you know his chief skill? 

It is only to fill 
And smoke a good pipe of tobacco. 

" The courtiers alone 

To this weed are not prone ; 
Would you know what 'tis makes them so slack — O? 

'Twas because it inclined 

To be honest the mind, 
And therefore they banished tobacco." 

One of the most curious pieces of verse ever written on 
tobacco is the following by Southey, entitled " Elegy on a 
Quid of Tobacco :" — 

" It lay before me on the close-grazed grass, 
Beside my path, an old tobacco quid : 
And shall I by the mute adviser pass 

Without one serious thought? now Heaven forbid 1 

" Perhaps some idle drunkard threw thee there — 
Some husband spendtlirift of his weekly hire ; 
One who for wife and children takes no care, 
But sits and tipples by the ale-house fire. 



120 CURIOUS VERSES. 

" Ah ! luckless was the day he learned to chew! 
Embryo of ills the quid that pleased him first; 
Thirsty from that unhappy quid he grew, 

Then to the ale-house went to quench his thirst. 

" So great events from causes small arise — 
The forest oak was once an acorn seed ; 
And many a wretch from drunkenness who diea, 
Owes all his evils to the Indian weed. 

" Let no temptation, mortal, ere come nigh! 
Suspect some ambush in the parsley hid ; 
Prom the first kiss of love ye maidens fly, 
Ye youths, avoid the first Tobacco-quid ! 

" Perhaps I wrong thee, O thou veteran chaw, 

And better thoughts my musings should engage ; 
That thou wert rounded in some toothless jaw, 
The joy, perhaps of solitary age. 

" One who has sufiered Fortune's hardest knocks, 
Poor, and with none to tend on his gray hairs ; 
Yet has a friend in his Tobacco-box, 
And, while he rolls his quid, forgets his caree. 

*' Even so it is with human happiness — 

Each seeks his own according to his whim ; 
One toils for wealth, one Fame alone can bless, 
One asks a quid — a quid is all to him. 

*' O, veteran chaw ! thy fibres savory, strong, 

While aught remained to chew, thy master chewed, 
Then cast thee here, when all thy juice was gone, 
Emblem of selfish man's ingratitude ! 

•♦ O, happy man ! O, cast-off quid ! is he 

Who, like as thou, has comforted the poor ; 
Happy his age who knows himself, like thee, 
Thou didst thy duty — man can do no more." 

Another well known song of the Seventeenth Centnry is 
entitled " The Tiyumph of Tobacco over Sack and Ale :"— 

" Nay, soft by your leaves, 

Tobacco bereaves 
You both of the garland; forbear it; 

You are two to one. 

Yet tobacco alone 
Is like both to win it, and weare it. 



TRIUMPH OF TOBACCO. 121 

Though many men crack, 
Some of ale, some of sack, 
And think they have reason to do it ; 
Tobacco hath more 
That will never give o'er 
The honor they do unto it. 
Tobacco engages 
Both sexes, all ages. 
The poor as well as the wealthy ; 
From the court to the cottage, 
Prom childhood to dotage, 
Both those that are sick and the healthy. 
It plainly appears 
That in a few years 
Tobacco more custom hath gained, 
Than sack, or than ale. 
Though they double the tale 
Of the times, wherein they have reigned. 
And worthily too. 
For what they undo 
Tobacco doth help to regaine, 
On fairer conditions 
Than many physitians. 
Puts an end to much griefe and paine ; 
It helpeth digestion. 
Of that there's no question. 
The gout and the tooth-ache it easeth : 
Be it early, or late, 
'Tis never out of date, 
He may- safely take it that pleaseth. 
Tobacco prevents 
Infection by scents. 
That hurt the brain, and are headj. 
An antidote is. 
Before you're amisse, 
As well as an after remedy. 
The cold it doth heate. 
Cools them that do sweate, 
And them that are fat maketh lean : 
The hungry doth teed. 
And if there be need, 
Spent spirits restoreth again. 

The poets of old, 4 

Many fables have told, 
Of the gods and their symposia; 
But tobacco alone. 
Had they known it, had gone 



122 A GOVERNMENT MONOPOLY. 

For their nectar and ambrosia. 

It is not the smack 

Of ale or of sack, 
That can with tobacco compare : 

For taste and for smell, 

It heares away the bell 
From them both, wherever they are : 

For all their bravado. 

It is Trinidado, 
That both their noses will wipe 

Of the praises they desire, 

Unless they conspire 
To sing to the tune of his pipe. 

The history of the rise and progress of tobacco in England, 
is one of the most interesting features connected with the 
nse and cultivation of the plant. In Spain, Portugal, 
Germany and Holland the plant was sustained and encour- 
aged by the throne, and royalty was the strongest and most 
devoted defender it had. It saw in the encouragement 
of its use, an income of revenue and a source of profit far 
greater than that received from any other product. Soon 
after its cultivation began in France, Spain, and Portugal, 
the tobacco trade was farmed out. 

From its first cultivation in these countries it has been a 
government monopoly. In 1753, the King of Portugal 
farmed out the tobacco trade, and from that time until now, 
the annual amount received has been one of the principal 
sources of revenue to the crown. In France, as early as 
1674, a monopoly of the trade was granted to Jean Breton 
for six years, for the sum of 700,000 francs. 

In 1720 the Indian Company paid for the privilege 
1,500,000 francs per annum ; and in 1771 the price was 
increased to 25,000,000 francs. Besides France there are 
thirteen other European states where the tobacco trade is a 
government monopoly, namely, Austria, Spain, Sicily, Sar* 
dinia, Poland, Papal States, Portugal, Tuscany, Modena, 
Parma, San Marino, Lichtenstein. 

From the first cultivation of the plant, its growers saw in 
the tobacco trade a vast and constantly increasing source of 



TOBACCO A BLESSING. 123 

wealth. They doubtless in some measure comprehended the 
close relation existing between it and commerce and realized 
how extensive would be its use. 

From the nature of the plant, it affords states and nations 
an opportunity to engage either in its culture or commerce 
with the prospect of the largest success. In this respect it is 
far different from any other tropical plant, and unlike them 
is capable of being cultivated in portions of the earth far 
remote from the tropics. In Switzerland and in the Caucas- 
sias it attains to a considerable size, but is nevertheless 
tobacco although it may possess but few of the excellences of 
some varieties, still it affords some enjoyment to the user, 
from the fact that it is the Indian weed. Fairholt speaking 
of the tobacco trade says : 

" The progress of the tobacco trade from the earliest intro- 
duction of the plant into Europe until now, is certainly one of 
the most curious that commerce presents. That a plant 
originally smoked by a few savages, should succeed in spite 
of the most stringent opposition in church and state, to be 
the cherished luxury of the whole civilized world ; to increase 
with the increase of time, and to end in causing so vast a 
trade, and so large an outlay of money ; is a statistical fact, 
without an equal parallel." 

The tobacco plant notwithstanding its fascinating powers, 
has suffered many romantic vicissitudes in its fame and 
character ; having been successively opposed and com- 
mended by physicians, condemned and eulogized by priests, 
vilified and venerated by kings, and alternately pro- 
scribed and protected by governments, this once insignifi- 
cant production of a little island or an obscure district, has 
succeeded in diffusing itself throughout every clime, and- 
exhilarating and enriching its thousands — has subjected the 
inhabitants of every country to its dominion. And every 
where it is a source of comfort and enjoyment ; in the highest ; 
grades of civilized society, at the shrine of fashion, in the I 
depths of poverty, in the palace and in the cottage, the • 
fascinating influence of this singular plant demands an equal/ 
tribute of devotion and attachment. 




CHAPTEK VI. 

TOBACCO-PIPES, SMOKING AND SMOKERS. 

"HE implements used in smoking tobacco, from tlie 
rude pipe of the Indian to the elaborate hookah of 
the Turk, show a far greater variety than even the 
various species of the tobacco plant. The instru- 
ments used by the Indians for inhaling the tobacco smoke 
were no less wonderful to Europeans than the plant itself. 

The rude mode of inhaling the smoke and the intoxication 
produced by its fumes suggested to the Spaniards a better 
method of " taking tobacco." Hariot, however, found clay 
pipes in use by the Indians of Virginia, which though having 
no resemblance to the smoking implements discovered by 
Columbus, seem to have afforded a model for those afterward 
manufactured by the Virginia colony. The sailors of Colum- 
bus seemed to have first discovered cigar, rather than pipe- 
smoking, inasmuch as the simple method used by the natives, 
consisted of a leaf of maize, which enwrapped a few leaves 
of the plant. 

The next instruments discovered in use among the Indians 
were straight, hollow reeds and forked canes. Their mode 
of use was to place a few leaves upon coals of fire and by 
placing the forked end in the nostrils and the other upon the 
smoking leaves, to inhale the smoke until they were stupified 
or drunken with the fumes. Their object in inhaling the 
fumes of tobacco seemed to be to produce intoxication and 
insensibility rather than a mode of enjoyment, although the 
enjoyment with them consisted of seeing the most remark- 
able visions when stupefied by its fumes. Such were the 

124 



INDIAN PIPES. 125 

modes of smoking among the Indians when Columbus planted 
the banner of Spain in America. 

A writer in The Tobacco Plant has given a very interest- 
ing description of Indian pipes in use among the natives of 
both North and South America. He eays : 

" In the tumuli or Indian grave mounds of the Ohio and 
Scioto valleys, large quantities of pipes have been found, 
bearing traces of Indian ingenuity. That their burial mounds 
are of great antiquity, is proved by the fact that trees several 
centuries old are to be found growing upon them. About 
twenty-live years ago, two distinguished archeologists Squier 
and Davis — made extensive exploration of these mounds, the 
results of which were published in an elaborate memoir by 
the Smithsonian Institution. The mounds indicate that an 
immense amount of labor has been expended upon them, as 
the earthworks and mounds may be counted by thousands, 
requiring either long time or an immense population ; and 
there is much probability in the supposition of Sir John Lub- 
bock that these parts of America were once inhabited by a num- 
erous and agricultural population. It may be asked, have the 
races who erected these extensive mounds become extinct, or 
do they exist in the poor uncivilized tribes of Indians whom 
Europeans found inhabiting the river valleys of Ohio and 
Illinois ? Many of these mounds are in the form of serpents 
and symbolic figures, and were evidently related to the 
sacrificial worship of the mound builders.'" 

Squier and Davis are of the opinion that : — 

" The mound builders were inveterate smokers, if the great 
numbers of pipes discovered in the mounds be admitted as 
evidence of the fact. These constitute not only a numerous, 
but a singularly interesting class of remains. In their con- 
struction the skill of the maker seems to have been exhausted. 
Their general form, which may be regarded as the primitive 
form of the implement, is well exhibited in the accompany- 
ing sketch. They are always carved from a single piece, and 
consist of a flat carved bore of variable length and width, 
with the bowl rising from the centre of the convex side. 
From one of the ends, and communicating with the hollow 
of the bowl, is drilled a small hole, which answers the pur- 
pose of a tube ; the corresponding opposite division being 
left for the manifest purpose of holding the implement to 
the mouth. 

"The specimen here represented is finely carved from a 




126 MATERIAL FOR PIPES. 

"beautiful variety of brown porphyry, granulated with various- 
colored materials, the whole much changed by the action of 
fire, and somewhat resembling porcelain. It is intensely 
hard, and successfully resists the edge of the finest-tempered 

knife. The length of the 
base is five inches ; breadth 
of the same one inch and a- 
quarter. The bowl is one 
inch and a-quarter high, 
slightly tapering upwards, 
but flaring near the top. The 
hollow of the bowl is six- 
iNDiAN PIPE. ^gj^j.j^g Qf ^^ Ij^^I^ -j^ diameter. 

The perforation answering to the tube is one-sixth of an 
inch in diameter, which is about the usual size. This cir- 
cumstance places it beyond doubt that the mouth was applied 
directly to the implement, without the intervention of a 
tube of wood or metal." 

This is an account of a simple pipe, with a small bowl ; but 
most of the pipes found in the mounds are highly ornamented 
with elaborate workmanship, representing animals such as 
the beaver, otter, bear, wolf, panther, raccoon, squirrel, wild- 
catj manotee, eagle, hawk, heron, swallow, paroquet, etc. 
One of the most interesting of the spirited sculptures of 
animal forms to be found on the mound pipes, is the repre- 
sentation of the Lamantin, or Manotee, a cetacean found only 
in tropical waters, and the nearest place which they at 
present frequent is the coast of Florida — at least a thousand 
miles away. According to Sir John Lubbock, these are no 
rude sculptures, for the characteristics of the animal are all 
distinctly marked, rendering its recognition complete. Many 
modern Indians are possessed of a wonderful aptitude for 
sculpture, and they appear to gladly exchange their work for 
the necessaries of life. 

The material most prized for the purpose of pipe-making 
is the beautiful red pipe-stone of the Coteau des Prairies, 
which is an indurated aluminous stone, highly colored with 
red oxide of iron. It is frequently called " Catlinite," out of 
compliment to George Catlin, the distinguished collector of 
Indian traditions, who claims to be the first European that 



LEGEND OF THE RED PIPE. 127 

ever visited the Red Pipe-stone Quarry, which is situated 
amongst the upper waters of Missouri. Catlin gives the 
followinff legend as the Indian version of the birth of the 
mysterious red pipe : — 

" The Great Spirit, at an ancient period, here called together 
the Indian warriors, and standing on the precipice of the 
red pipe-stone rock, broke from its wall a piece, and made 
a huge pipe by turning it in his hand, which he smoked over 
them, and to the north, the south, the east and the west ; 
and told them that this stone was red, that it was their flesh, 
that they must use it for their pipes of peace, that it belonged 
to them all, and that the war club and the scalping knife 
must not be raised on its ground. At the last whiff of his 
pipe his head went into a great cloud, and the whole surface 
of the rock for several miles was melted and glazed. Two 
great ovens were opened beneath, and two women, guardian 
spirits of the place, entered them in a blaze of Are, and they 
are heard there yet, answering to the invocations of the 
priests and medicine-men." 

At the pipe-stone quarry there is a row of five huge, 
granite boulders, which the Indians regard with great 
reverence, and when they visit the spot to secure some red 
stone to make pipes, they seek to propitiate the guardian 
spirits by throwing plugs of Tobacco to them. Some admi- 
rable pieces of pij^e-sculpture are produced by the Boheen 
Indians, who are found on the coast of the Pacific to the south 
of the Ilussia,ns. These pipes are made from a soft blue clay 
stone which is found only in slabs, and the sculptures are 
wrought on both sides, the pipes being generally covered with 
singular groups of human and animal forms, grotesquely 
intermingled. 

The Chippewas are also celebrated for their pipes, which 
are cut out of a close-grained stone of a dark color ; and Pro- 
fessor Wilson, of Toronto, states that Pobahmesad, or the 
Flier, one of the famed pipe-sculptors, resides on the Great 
Manitoulin Island in Lake Huron. The old Chippewa has 
never deviated from the faith of his fathers, as he still adheres 
to all their rites and ceremonies. He uses the red pipe-stone 
and other materials in the production of his pipes, which are 
ingenious specimens of sculpture. The calumet, or pipe of 



128 CHIPPEWA PIPES. 

peace, is still an object of special reverence with the Indian 
tribes, and the pipe-stem is ornamented with six or eight eagle's 



SCULPTURED PIPE. 



feathers. Each tribe has an official who takes charge of the 
calumet, which he keeps rolled up in a bearskin robe ; and 
it's never exposed to view or used, except when the chief 
enters into a treaty with some neighboring chief. On these 
occasions the pipe is taken out of its covering by the Indian 
dignitary, ready charged with the " holy weed," when it is 
smoked by all the chiefs, each one taking only a single breath 
of smoke, which is regarded as implementing the treaty. 
The pipe is then rolled up in its robe of fur, and stowed 
away in the lodge of its keeper until it is again required. 
The war pipe is simply a tomahawk, with a perforated handle 
communicating with the bowl, which is opposite the sharp 
edge of the weapon. "When the Indians joined the British 
as allies during the American war, they had to be supplied 
with iron tomahawks of the native pattern, before they 
could enter the field as allies. 

Many tribes of Indians use herbs of various kinds to mix 
with tobacco to reduce its strength, as they are in the habit 
of exhaling the smoke from the nostrils, and not from the 
mouth. By the adoption of this means a much smaller 
quantity of tobacco suffices to produce the soothing influence 
on the nervous system so well known to votaries of the weed. 

Longfellow, in his great Indian epic of the Song of Hiawa- 
tha, has portrayed with graphic power in pleasing verse the 
mysterious legends describing the birth or institution of the 
peace-pipe by Gitche Manito, " The Master of Life ; " and a 
few extracts from " Biawatha " may be interesting to illus- 



" HIAWATHA." 129 

trate the deep significance of the ideas which the Indian holds 
regarding his relations to the Great Spirit of the Universe, 
and of the esteem with which he views the peace-pipe, which 
in the words of Catlin "has shed its thrilling fumes over 
the land, and soothed the fiirj of the relentless savage." 
Longfellow, in the opening of his poem, says : — 

"Ye whose hearts are fresh and simple, 

Who have faith in God and Nature, ► 

Who believe that in all ages 

Every human heart is human, 

That in even savage bosoms 

There are longings, yearnings, strivings, 

Por the good they comprehend not. 

That the feeble hands and helpless. 

Groping blindly in the darkness, 

Touch God's right hand in that darkness 

And are lifted up and strengthened ; — 

Listen to this simple story, 

To the song of Hiawatha. 

He then describes the making of the pipe from the great 
Eed Pipe-Stone Quarry, as follows : — 

" On the Mountains of the Prairie, 
On the great Red Pipe-Stone Quarry, 
Gitche Manito, the mighty. 
He the Master of Life, descending, 
On the red crags of the quarry 
Stood erect, and called the nations, 
Called the tribes of men together. 
From his foot-prints flowed a river. 
Leaped into the light of morning, 
O'er the precipice plunging downward 
Gleamed like Ishkoodah, the comet. 
And the Spirit stooping earthward, 
With his finger on the meadow 
Traced a winding pathway for it, 
Saying to it, ' Run in this way !' 

" From the red stone of the quarry 
With his hand he broke a fragment, 
Moulded it into a pipe-head. 
Shaped and fashioned it with figures ; 
From the margin of the river 



130 MAKING THE " PEACE-PIPES." 

Took a long reed for a pipe-stem, 
With its dark green leaves upon it ; 
Filled the pipe with bark of willow; 
With the bark of the red willow ; 
Breathed upon the neighboring forest, 
Made its great boughs chafe together, 
Till in flame they burst and kindled ; 
And erect upon the mountains, 
Gitche Manito, the mighty, 
Smoked the calumet, the Peace-Pipe, 
As a signal to the nations." 




PIPE OP PEACE. 

The next verses describe the assembling of the nations at 
the call of Gitche Manito, who proceeds to speak to his 
children words of wisdom and announces that he : 

*' ' Will send a prophet to you, 
A Deliverer of the nations. 
Who shall guide you and shall teach you, 
Who shall toil and suffer with you. 
So you listen to his counsels. 
You will multiply and prosper ; 
If his warnings pass unheeded. 
You will fade away and perish ! 

** * Bathe now in the stream before you, 
Wash the war-paint from your faces. 
Wash the blood-stains from your fingers. 
Bury your war-clubs and your weapons. 
Break the red stone from this quarry, 
Mould and make it into Peace-Pipes, 
Take the reeds that grow beside you. 
Deck them with your highest feathers, 



SOUTH AMERICAN PIPES. 131 

Smoke the calumet together, 

And as brothers live henceforward!' 

* * * * 

" And in silence all the warriors 
Broke the red stone of the quarry, 
Smoothed and formed it into Peace-Pipes, 
Broke the long reeds by the river. 
Decked them with their brightest feathers, 
And departed each one homeward, 
While the Master of Life, ascending 
Through the opening of cloud curtains. 
Through the doorways of the heavens, 
Vanished from before their faces. 
In the smoke that rolled around him, 
The Pukwana of the Peace-Pipe!" 

Along the nortliern parts of America, are to be found tbe 
Esquimaux population, estimated to number about 60,000. 

They are votaries of the weed, making their pipes either 
out of driftwood, or of the bones of animals they have used 
for food. 

Tobacco is found growing along the whole western sea- 
board of South Amei-ica until we reach the northern bound- 
aries of Patagonia. Far inland on the banks of the Amazon, 
Rio Niger, and other great rivers, the weed has been found 
in luxurious abundance, with a delightful fragrance. 

Stephens, in his " Travels in Central America," says that 
" the ladies of Central America generally smoke — tlie mar- 
ried using tobacco, and the unmarried, cigars formed of selected 
tobacco rolled in paper or rice straw. Every gentleman 
carries in his pocket a silver case, with a long string of cotton, 
steel and flint, and one of the offices of gallantry is to strike 
a light. By doing it well, he may help to kindle a flame in 
a lady's heart ; at all events, to do it bnnglingly would be 
ill-bred. I will not express my sentiments on smoking as a 
custom for the sex. I have recollections of beauteous lips 
profaned. Nevertheless, even in this I have seen a lady 
show her prettiness and refinement, barely touching the 
straw on lier lips, as it were kissing it gently and taking it 
away. "When a gentleman asks a lady for a light, she always 
removes the cigar from her lips." 

The Rev. Canon Kingsley, in his fascinating novel of 
^ Westward Ho ! " has some quaint remarks on the method 



132 



CIGARETTES. 



■,">/'/l 



im 



of smoking described by Lionel Wafer, 
surgeon to Dampier, which are well worth 
quoting. He says, "When they, (the 
Darien Indians,) will deliberate on war 
or policy, they sit round in the hut of 
the chief ; where being placed, enter to 
them a small boy with a cigarro of the 
bigness of a rolling-pin, and puffs the 
smoke thereof into the face of each war- 
rior, from the eldest to the youngest ; 
while they, putting their hands funnel- 
wise round their mouths, draw into the 
t-inuosities of the brain that more than 
Delphic vapor of prophecy ; which boy 
presently falls down in a swoon, and 
being dragged out by the heels and laid 
by to sober, enter another to puff at the 
sacred cigarro, till he is dragged out like- 
wise, and so on till the Tobacco is tin- 
ished, and the seed of wisdom has sprouted 
in every soul into the tree of meditation, 
bearing the flower of eloquence, and in 
due time the fruit of valiant action." 
Tobacco in the form of cigarettes, is 
extensively used by the inhabitants of 
Nicaragua^ Guiana, and the dwellers on 
the banks of the Orinoco, and the use 
of the weed is not confined to the male 
sex, but is freely used both by the female 
and juvenile portions of the community. 
Mr. Squier, in his " Travels in Nicara- 
gua," states that the dress of the young 
urchins consists mainly of a straw hat 
and a cigar — the cigar when not in use 
being stuck behind the ear, in the man- 
ner in which our clerks place their pens. 
The natives of Guiana use a tube or 
pipe not unlike a cheroot, made from 
the rind of the fruit of a species of palm. 
This curious pipe is called a " Winna," 



TOBACCO ON THE AMAZON RIVER. 133 

and the hollow is filled with tobacco, the smoking of which 
afibrds much enjoyment to the denizens of the swampj 
regions of Guiana. 

Mr. Cooke, in " The Seven Sisters of Sleep," states that a 
tube much resembling the " Winna " of Guiana was some 
years ago to be met with in the Tobacconists' Shops in 
London. The Indian dwelling in the dense forests in the 
region of Orinoco has found that tobacco is an excellent 
solace to relieve the monotony of his life; he uses 
it "not only to procure an afternoon nap, but also to 
induce a state of quiescence which they call dreaming with 
their eyes open." We find from voyagers up the Amazon, 
that smoking prevails not merely amongst the natives inhabit- 
ing the regions which skirt that great river, but also amongst 
the people on the banks of its numerous tributaries. Mr. 
Bates the distinguished Naturalist, when making researches 
far up one of the tributaries of the Amazon, found tobacco 
extensively cultivated, and some distinguished makers of 
cigarettes. One maker, Joan Trinidade, was noted for his 
Tobacco and Tauri cigarettes. This cigar is so named from 
the bark in which the tobacco is rolled. Some of the tribes 
inhabiting the district of the lower Amazon indulge in snuff- 
taking. This snuff is not made from tobacco, it is the produce 
of a plant of the leguminous order, the seeds being carefully 
collected and thoroughly dried in the sun before they are 
pounded in a mortar, when the powder is ready for use. 
The snuff-making season is quite an event in a Brazilian 
village, the week or so during which it lasts forming a kind 
of religious festival mingled with a good deal of indulgence 
in fermented liquors, chiefly of native origin. 

Humboldt, when traveling in South America, found in use 
among the Ottomac Indians a powder called Niopo, or " In- 
dian snuff." Niopo is a powerful stimulant, a small portion 
of it producing violent sneezing in persons unaccustomed to 
its use. Father Gumilla says : — " This diabolical powder of 
the Ottomacs, furnished by an adolescent tobacco plant, 
intoxicates them through the nostrils, deprives them of 



134: BRAZILIAN TOBACCO. 

reason for some Lours, and renders them furious in battle." 
Humboldt, however, has shown that this stimulating snufF is 
not the product of the tobacco plant, but of a species of acacia, 
Niopo being made from the pods of tiie plant after tliey have 
undergone a process of fermentation. 'Captain Burton, when 
traveling in the Highlands of Brazil, found the tobacco plant 
growing spontaneously, which made him conclude that it is 
indigenous to Brazil. /) He found the " Aromatic Brazilian " 
a kind of tobacco witlil thin leaves and a pink flower, which is 
" much admired in the United States, and there found to lose 
its aroma after the second year." It is usually asserted that 
the tobacco grown in Brazil contains only two per cent, of 
nicotine, but Captain Burton is disposed to doubt this, as he 
states that some varieties of the " holy herb " grown at Sa'a* 
Paulo and Nimos suggests a larger proportion. In the small 
towns in the Highlands of Brazil, Captain Burton found that 
excellent cigars, better than many " Havannas," were retailed 
at a halfpenny each. In La Plata, Paraguay, and other 
countries to the south of Brazil, nearly every person smokes, 
and an American traveler quoted by Mr. Cooke states that 
women and girls above thirteen years of age use the weed in 
the form of quids. A magnificent Hebe, arrayed in satin and 
flashing in diamonds, "puts you back with one delicate hand, 
■while with the fair taper fingers of the other she takes the 
tobacco out of her mouth previous to your saluting her." A 
European visiting Paraguay for the first time is rather aston- 
ished at the conduct of the fair beauty, but such is the force 
of custom that the squeamishness of Ihe new-comer is soon 
overcome, when he finds that he has to kiss every lady ta 
whom he is introduced ; and the traveler says that " one half 
of those you meet are really tempting enough to render you 
reckless of consequences." 

Smoking is practised by the natives of Patagonia, who are 
a tall and muscular class of men, though not such giants as 
represented by the early voyagers. Hutchinson, in a vahia- 
ble paper on the Indians of South America has an account 
of the Pehuenches, one of the principal tribes of Patagonia, 



PATAGONIANS AS SMOKERS. 



135 



in which he states that "their chief indulgence is smoking. 
The native pipes are fabricated out of a piece of stone, 
fiishioned into the shape of a bowl, into which is inserted a 
long brass tube. The latter is obtained by barter at Bohia 
Elanca. The tobacco in the bowl being lighted, each man of 
a party takes a suck at the pipe in his turn." Tilston, who 
witnessed the operation, describes it as a most ludicrous one. 
" The smoker gives a pull at the pipe, gulping in a quantity 
of Tobacco vapour, the cubic measurement of which my 
informant would be afraid to guess at. All the muscles of 
the body seem in a temporary convulsion whilst it is being 
taken in, and the neighbour to whom the pipe is transferred 
follows suit by inhaling as if he were trying to swallow down 
brass tube, bowl. Tobacco, fire, and all. Meanwhile, there 
issues from the nose and mouth of the previous smoker such 
a cumulus of cloud as for a few seconds to render his face 
quite invisible." Tobacco is more used in Chili than in the 
other countries on the Pacific side of South America ; this is 
owing to the extensive use of the leaves of the Cocoa plant as 
a narcotic by the natives of Bolivia, Peru, and Colombia. 

We refrain from enlarging on the nature and use of this 
narcotic, as on some future occasion we may take an oppor- 
tunity of making some observations on Cocoa, which according 
to Jonson, holds an undisputed sway over some seven or 




SOUTH AMERICANS SMOKING. 



eight millions of the inhabitants of South America. The 
Indians formerly inhabiting the high table-lands of what is 
DOW called Peru and Bolivia appear prior to the invasion of 



136 FORM AND MATERIAL. 

the Spaniards to have been much further advanced in 
civilization than the races occupying the other portions of 
South America ; and there is a strong probability that thej 
are of a different origin from the races occupying Chili, 
Patagonia, Brazil, and the great district washed by the waters 
of the "West Indian Sea. Science as yet cannot give any- 
thing like an accurate idea of the time man has existed in 
these widely-diversified countries, but we cannot go wrong 
in accepting the statement of Darwin, who observes that " we 
must admit that man has inhabited South America for an 
immensely long period, inasmuch as any change in climate, 
effected by the elevation of the land must have been 
extremely gradual." 

Another writer says of the pipes of the Indians of North 
America : 

"Great variety of form and material distinguishes the 
pipes of the modern Indians; arising in part from the 
local facilities they possess for a suitable material from which 
to construct them ; and in part also from the special style of 
art and decoration which has become the traditional usage of 
the tribes. The favorite red pipe-stone of the Coteau des 
Prairies, has been generally sought after, both from its 
easiness of working and the beauty of its appearance. A 
pipe of this favorite and beautiful material, found on the 
shores of Lake Simcoe, and now in my possession, measures 
five inches and three-quarters in length, and nearly four 
inches in greatest breadth, yet the capacity of the bowl 
hollowed in it for the reception of tobacco is even less than 
in the smallest of the " Elfin Pipes." In contrast to this, a 
modern Winnebago pipe recently acquired by me, made of the 
same red pipe-stone, inlaid with lead, and executed with 
ingenious skill, has a bowl of large dimensions illustrative of 
Indian smoking usages modified by the influence of the 
white man. From the red pipe-stone, as well as from the 
lime stone and other harder rocks, the Chippeways, the 
Winnebagos, and the Sioux, frequently make a peculiar class 
of pipes, inlaid with lead, 

" The Chincok and Puget Sound Indians, who evince 
little taste in comparison with the tribes surrounding them, 
in ornamenting their persons or their warlike and domestic 
implements, commonly use wooden pipes. Sometimes these 
are elaborately carved, but most frequently they are rudely 



MORE INDIAN PIPES. I37 

and hastily made for immediate use ; and even among these 
remote tribes of the flat head Indians, the common clay pipe 
of the fur trader begins to supersede such native arts. Among 
the Assinaboin Indians a material is used in pipe manufac- 
ture altogether peculiar to them. It is a fine marble, much too 
hard to admit of minute carving, but taking a high polish. 
This is cut into pipes of graceful form, and made so extremely 
thin, as to be almost transparent, so that when lighted the 
glowing tobacco shines through, and presents a singular 
appearance when in use at night or in a dark lodge. 
Another favorite material employed by the Assinaboin 
Indians is a coarse species of jasper also too hard to admit of 
elaborate ornamentation." 

This also is cut into various simple but tasteful designs, 
executed chiefly by the slow and laborious process of rub- 
bing it down with other stones. The choice of the material 
for fashioning the favorite pipe is by no means invariably 
guided by the facilities which the location of the tribe 
affords. A suitable stone for such a purpose will be picked 
up and carried hundreds of miles. Mr. Kane informs me 
that, in coming down the Athabaska River, when drawing 
near its source in the Rocky Mountains, he observed his 
Assinaboin guides select the favorite bluish jasper from 
among the water-worn stones in the bed of the river, to carry 
home for the purpose of pipe manufacture, although they 
were then fully five hundred miles from their lodges. Such 
a traditional adherence to a choice of material peculiar to a 
remote source, may frequently prove of considerable value as 
a clue to former migrations of the tribes. Both the Cree 
and the "Winnebago Indians carve pipes in stone of a form 
now more frequently met with in the Indian curiosity stores 
of Canada and the States than any other specimens of native 
carving. The tube, cut at a sharp right angle with the cylin- 
drical bowl ^f the pipe, is ornamented with a thin vandyked 
ridge, generally perforated with a row of holes, and standing 
up somewhat like the dorsal fin of a fish. The Winnebagos 
also manufacture pipes of the same form, but of a smaller 
size, in lead, with considerable skill. 

Among the Cree Indians a double j)ipe is occasionally in 



138 PIPE OF THE BOBEEN INDIANS. 

use, consisting of a bowl carved out of stone without much 
attempt at ornament, but with perforations on two sides, so 
that two smokers can insert their pipe-stems at once, and 
enjoy the same supply of tobacco. It does not appear, how- 
ever, that any special significance is attached to this singular 
fancy. The Saiiltaux Indians, a branch of the great Algon- 
quin nation, also carve their pipes out of a black stone found 
in their countrj'^, and evince considerable skill in the execu- 
tion of their elaborate details. But the most remarkable of 
all the specimens of pipe sculpture executed by the Indians 
of the north-west are those carved by the Bobeen, or Big-lip 
Indians, — so called from the singular deformity they produce 
by inserting a piece of wood into a slit made in the 
lower lip. 

The Bobeen Indians are found along the Pacific coast, 
about latitude 54*^, 40', and extend from the borders of the 
Russian dominions eastward nearly to Frazer River. The 
pipes of the Bobeen, and also of the Clalam Indians, occu- 
pying the neighboring Vancouver's Island, are carved with 
the utmost elaborateness and in the most singular and gro- 
tesque devices, from a soft blue clay-stone or slate. Their 
form is in part determined by the material, which is only 
procurable in thin slabs, so that the sculptures, wrought on 
both sides, present a sort of double bas-relief. From this, 
singular and grotesque groups are carved without any appa- 
rent reference to the final destination of the whol" as a pipe. 
The lower side is generally a straight line, and in the speci- 
mens I have examined they measure from two or three to 
fifteen inches long; so that in these the pipe-stem is included. 
A small hollow is carved .out of some protruding ornament 
to serve as the bowl of the pipe, and from the further end a 
perforation is drilled to connect with this. The only addition 
made to it when in use is the insertion of a quill or straw as 
a mouth-piece. The Indians have both war and peace 
pipes. 

The War pipe is a true tomahawk of ordinary size with a 
perforated handle the tobacco being placed in the receptacle 



THE WAR PIPE. 



139 




WAR PIPE. 



above the hatchet the handle serving as a pipe-stem and used 
for either pipe or tomahawk. Many varieties of Indian 
Pipes have been 
found not only in 
the Western and 
Southern mounds 
hut in Mexico and 
Central America. 
Fine specimens are 
found in Florida 
and some elabo- 
rately carved have 
been unearthed in 
Virginia. Wilson 
says of the pipes 
used by the Indians : " The pipe stem is one of the charac- 
teristics of modern race, if not distinctive of the Northern 
tribes of Indians." In alluding to the pipes more particularly 
he says : " Specimens of another class of clay pipes of a larger 
size, and with a tube of such length as obviously to be 
designed for use without the addition of a "pipe-stem," 
most of the ancient clay pipes that have been discovered are 
stated to have the same form ; and this, it may be noted, 
bears so near a resemblance to that of the red clay pipe used 
in modern Turkey, with the cherry-tree pipe stem, that it 
might be supposed to have furnished the model. 

The bowls of this class of ancient clay pipes are n.ot of 
the miniature proportions which induce a comparison between 
those of Canada and the early examples found in Britain ; 
neither do the stone pipe-heads of the mound-builders suggest 
by the size of the bowl either the self-denying economy of 
the ancient smoker, or his practice of the modern Indian 
mode of exhaling the fumes of the tobacco, by which so 
Bmall a quantity suffices to produce the full narcotic effects 
of the favorite weed. They would rather seem to confirm 
the indications derived from the other sources, of an essential 
difference between the ancient smoking usages of Central 
America and of the mound-builders, and those which are 



140 PIPE SCULPTURE. 

still maintained in their primeval integrity among the 
Indians of the North West. 

Of the mound-builders Foster says : 

"The mound-builders were well aware of the narcotic proper- 
ties of tobacco, a plant which indigenous to America, and 
which since the discovery of the western continent has been 
domesticated in every region of the earth where the soil and 
climate are favorable to its cultivation. No habit at this day, 
it may be said, is more universal or more difficult to eradi- 
cate than that of smoking. With the mound-builder tobacco 
was the greatest of luxuries; his solace in his hours of 
relaxations, and the choicest offering he could dedicate to the 
Great Spirit. Upon his pipe he lavished all the skill he 
possessed in the lapidary's art. 

"From the red stone of the quarry 
With his hand he broke a fragment 
Moulded it into a pipe head 
Shaped and fashioned it with figures." 

Many of these pipes are sculptured from the most obdurate 
stones and display great delicacy of workmanship. The 
features of animals are so truthfully cut that often there is no 
difficulty in their identification, and even the plumage of 
birds is delineated by curved or straight lines which show a^ 
close adherence to nature. The bowl and stem piece 
wrought from a single block, are as accurately drilled as they 
could be at this day, by the lapidary's art. Both the 
War pipe and Peace pipe are the most sacred and the most 
highly valued of all the various kinds. 

" The calumet, or pipe of peace, ornamented with the war 

eagles quill, is a sacred 
pipe, and never used on 
any other occasion than 
that of peace making, 
when the chief brings it 
into treaty, and untbld- 
™.^^ „.„„ inff the many bandages 

PEACE PIPE. P . 1 ' f 11 

which are caretully 
kept around it, has it ready to be mutually smoked by the 
chiefs, after the terms of the treaty are agreed upon, as the 
means of solemnizing it ; which is done by passing the sacred 
stem to each chief, who draws one breath of smoke only 




SMOKING IN ALASKA. 141 

throuffli it. Nothing can be more binding than smoking the 
pipe of peace and is considered by them to be an inviolable 
pledo-e There is no cvistom more uniformly in constant use 
amongst the poor Indians than that of smoking nor any more 
highly valued. His pipe is his constant companion through 
litl-Jhis messenger of peace ; he pledges his friends through 
its stem and its bowl, and when its care-drowning lume& 
cease to flow, it takes a place with him in his solitaiy grave 
with his tomahawk and war-chib companions to his long- 
fancied 'happy hunting grounds.'" 

From specimens of clay pipes found at the South from 
Virginia to Florida it would seem that the Indians had a 
great variety of pipes some of which were beautifully carved 
while others are perfectly plain. Many of them however are 
of rude workmanship and might have been fashioned by 
8ome of the tribe unacquainted with pipe-making. 

Dall gives the following account of smoking among the 
natives of Alaska : 

"We broke camp about five o'clock in the morning. 
Nothing occurred to break the monotony of constant steady 
plodding. Two Indians in the bow of the boat would 
row until tired, and then we would stop for a few minutes to 
rest, and let them smoke. The last operation takes less than 
a minute ; their pipes are so constructed as to hold but a very 
small pinch of tobacco. The bowl, with ears for tying it to 
the stem is generally cast out of lead. Sometimes it is made 
of soft stone, bone or even hard wood. The stem is made of 
two pieces of wood hollowed on one side, and bound to the 
bowl and each other by a narrow strip of deerskin. _ In 
Binoking the economical Indian generally cuts up a. little 
birch wood, or the inner bark of the poplar, and mixes it 
with his tobacco. A few reindeer hairs pulled from his 
paska, are rolled into a little ball, and placed in the bottom 
of the bowl to prevent the contents from being drawn into 
the stem. A pinch of tobacco cut as fine as snuff is inserted 
and two or three whifis are afforded by it. 

The smoke is inhaled into the lungs, producing a momen- 
tary stupor and the operation is over. A fungus which 
grows on decayed birch trees, or tinder manufactured from 
the down of the poplar rubbed up with charcoal is used with 
flint and steel for obtaining a light. Matches are highly 



142 GOOSE-QUILL STEMS. 

valued and readily purchased. The effect of the Circassian 
tobacco on the lungs is extremely bad, and among those 
tribes who use it many die from asthma and congestion of 
the lungs. This is principally due to the saltpetre with which 
it is impregnated. The Indian pipe is copied from the 
Eskimo, as the latter were the first to obtain and use tobacco. 
Many of the tribes call it by the Eskimo name. 

The Kutchin and Eastern Finneh were modeled after the 
clay pipes of the Hudson Bay Company, but they also carve 
very pretty ones out of bii'ch knots and the root of the wild 
rose-bush. The Chukchees use a pipe similar to those of the 
Eskimo, but with a much larger and shorter stem. This 
stem is hollow, and is filled with fine birch shavings. After 
smoking for some months these shavings impregnated with 
the oil of tobacco, are taken out through an oj)ening in the 
lower part of the stem and smoked over. The Hudson 
Baymen make passable pipe-stems by taking a straight-grained 
piece of willow or spruce without knots, and cuttiug through 
the outer layers of bark and wood. This stick is heated in 
the ashes and by twisting the end in contrary directions the 
heart-wood may be gradually drawn out, leaving a hollow 
tube. 

The Kutchin make pretty pipe-stems out of goose-quills 
wound about with porcupine-quills. It is the custom in the 
English forts to make ev-ery Indian who comes to trade, a 
present of a clay pipe filled with tobacco. We were provided 
with cheap brown ones, with wooden stems, which were 
much liked by the natives, and it is probable that small brier- 
wood pipes, which are not liable to break, would form an 
acceptable addition to any stock of trading goods". The 
Tchuktchi of north-eastern Asia are devoted worshipers of 
tobacco, and is one of the chief articles of trade with them. 
Their pipes are large, much larger at the stem than the bowl. 
In smoking, they swallow the fumes of the tobacco which 
causes intoxication for a time. " The desire to procure a few 
of its narcotic leaves induces the American Esquimaux from. 




SMOKING IN RUSSIA. 143 

the Ice Cape to Bristol Bay, to send their produce from hand 

to hand as far as the 
Guosden Islands in 
Belirings Straits, where 
it is bartered for the to- 
bacco of the Tchuktchi, 
and there again princi- 
pally resort to the fair of 
Ostrownoje to purchase 
A TCHUKTCHI PIPE. tobacco froui the Eus- 

sians. Generally the Tchuktchi receive from the Americans 
as money skins for half a pond, or eighteen pounds of 
tobacco leaves as they afterwards sell to the Russians for two 
ponds of tobacco of the same quality. 

The Russians also are great lovers of the weed. A writer 
says : — 

"Everybody smokes, men, women, and children. They 
smoke Turkish tobacco, rolled in silk paper — seldom cigars 
or pipes. These rolls are called parporos. The ladies almost 
all smoke, but they smoke the small, delicate sizes of parporos, 
while the gentlemen smoke larger ones. Always at morning, 
noon and night, comes the inevitable box of parporos, and 
everybody at the table smokes and drinks their coffee at the 
same time. On the cars are fixed little cups for cigar ashes 
in every seat. Ladies frequently take out their part parporos, 
and hand them to the gentlemen with a pretty invitation to 
smoke. Instead of having a smoking car as we do, they have 
a car for those who are so ' pokey ' as not to smoke." 

Throughout the German States the custom of smoking 

is universal and tobacco enters largely into their list of 

expenditures. A writer says of smoking in Austria: — 

/ "AVe have been rather surprised to find so few persons 

/smoking pipes in Austria. Indeed, a pipe is seldom seen 

[except among the laboring classes. The most favorite mode 

jof using the weed here is in cigarettes, almost every gentle- 

'man being provided with a silver box, in which they have 

Turkish tobacco and small slips of paper, with mucilage on 

them ready for rolling. They make them as they use them, 

and are very expert in the handling of the tobacco. The 



144 SMOKING IN PERU. 

. chewing of tobacco is universally repudiated, being regarded 
: as the height of vulgarity. The Turkish tobacco is of fine 
flavor, and commands high prices. It is very much in appear- 
ance like the fine cut chewing tobacco so extensively used at 
home." 

The cigars made by the Austrian Government, which are 
the only description to be had are very inferior, and it is not 
to be wondered that the cigarette is so generally used in 
preference. 

The smoking of cigarettes by the ladies is quite common, 
• especially among the higher classes. In no part of the world 
is smoking so common as in South America ; here all classes 
and all ages use the weed. Smoking is encouraged in the 
family and the children are early taught the custom. A 
traveler who has observed this custom more particularly than 
any other, says of the use of tobacco in Peru : — 

" Scarcely in any regions of the world is smoking so com- 
mon as in Peru. The rich as well as the poor, the old man 
as well as the boy, the master as well as the servant, the lady 
as well as the negroes who wait on her, the young maiden as 
well as the mother — all smoke and never cease smoking, 
except when eating, or sleeping, or in chnrch. Social distinc- 
tions are as numerous and as marked in Peru as anywhere 
else, and there is the most exclusive pride of color and of 
blood. But differences of color and of rank are wholly dis- 
regarded when a light for a cigar is requested, a favor which 
it is not considered a liberty to ask, and which it would be 
deemed a gross act of incivility to refuse. It is chiefly 
cigarritos which are smoked. 

" The cigarrito, as is well known, is tobacco cut fine and 
dexterously wrapped in moist maize leaves, in paper, or in 
straw. Only the laborers on the plantations smoke small 
clay pipes. Dearer than the cigarritos are the cigars, which 
are not inferior to the best Havanna. Everywhere are met 
the cigarrito-twisters. Cleverly though they manipulate, 
cleanliness is not their besetting weakness. But in Peru, 
and in other parts of South America, cleanliness is not held 
in more esteem than in Portugal and Spain." 

The Turks have long been noted as among the largest con- 
sumers of tobacco as well as using the most magnificent of 
smoking implements. The hookah is in all respects the most 
expensive and elaborate machine (for so it may be called) 



SMOKING IN TURKEY. 



145 



used for smoking tobacco. A traveler gives the following 
graphic description of smoking among them : 

"As each man smokes only out of his own pipe, it is not 
surprising that this instrument is an indispensable accompa- 




TURK SMOKING. 



niment of every person of rank. Men of the higher classes 
keep two or three servants to attend to their pipes. While 
one looks after things at home, the other has to accompany 
his master in his walks and rides. The long stem is on such 
occasions packed in a finely embroidered cloth cover, while 
the bowl, tobacco, and other accessories are carried by the 
servant in a pouch at his side. A stranger in Constantinople 
will often regard with curiosity and surprise, a proud Osmanli 
on foot or horseback, followed by an attendant who, through 
the long, carefully -packed instrument which he carries, gives 
one the idea that he is a weapon-bearer of some heroic period 
following his lord to some dangerous rendezvous. So are 
the times altered. What the armor-bearer was for the war- 
like races of old, such is the tchbukdi for their degenerate 
descendants. 

"To smoke from sixty to eighty pipes a day is by no 
10 



146 MODERATE SMOKING. 

means imcommon ; for whatever be the business, no matter 
how serious, in which the Turk is engaged, he must smoke 
at it. In the divan, where the grandees of the empire consult 
together on the most delicate affairs of State, the question 
was once mooted whether the tchbukdes should not be 
excluded from such debates as were of a strictly private 
nature. There was a great diversity of opinion on the sub- 
ject. Politics and reason were on opposite sides. At last it 
was decided that they would not disgrace an ancient national 
usage, but would allow the harmless attendants to enter the 
council-room every now and then to change the pipes. In 
Turkey, pipes and tobacco afford means of distinguishing not 
only the different classes of the community, but even the 
several graduates of rank in the same class. A mushir (mar- 
shal) would find it derogatory to his dignity to smoke out of 
a stem less than two yards in length. The artisan or official 
of a lower rank, would consider it highly unbecoming on his 
part to use one which exceeded the proper proportions of his 
class. A superior stretches his pipe before him to his inferior ; 
while the latter must hold his modestly on one side, only 
allowing the end of the mouth-piece to peep out of his closed 
fist. 

" The pasha has the right to puff" out his smoke before 
him like a steam engine, while his inferiors are only allowed 
to breathe forth a light curl of smoke, and that must be let 
off backwards. Not to smoke at all in the presence of a 
superior, is held the most delicate homage wliich can be paid 
him. A son, for instance, acts in this manner in the presence 
of his father, and only such a one is considered to be well 
brought up who declines to smoke even after his father has 
repeatedly invited him to do so. The fair sex in the East is 
scarcely less addicted to the use of this weed. 

" The girl of twelve years old smokes a cigarette of tho 
thickness of pack-thread. When she has attained her four- 
teenth or fifteenth year, and is already marriageable, she is 
allowed to indulge her penchant at will, which is forbidden 
when younger. After this age the diameter of the cigarette 
increases year by year ; and when a lady has readied the 
mature age of twenty-four, no one sees anything remarkable 
in her smoking a modest little chibouque as she sits on the 
lower divan of the harem. Elderly matrons — and in Turkey 
every lady is an elderly matron in her fortieth year — are 
passionately devoted to this enjoyment. The pipe-bowls and 
stems always remain of the size appropriated by etiquette to 



FEMALE SMOKING. 147 

the use of the harem ; but the strongest and most pungent 
sorts of tobacco are not unseldom smoked, until the mouth, 
wliich, according to the assurance of the poet, in the bloom 
of its youth breathed forth ambergiris and musk, in its forti- 
eth year acquires so strong a smell that the lady can be 
scented from a distance. 

"Like their lords, the hanyrus of rank have also their 
tchbukdes, of course of their own sex, who accompany them 
when out walking or on a visit. In this case, however, the 
cover in which the pipe-stem is made, not of cloth, but of 
silk. The habit of refreshing oneself with a pipe on some 
elevated spot which commands a fine view, is common to 
both sexes. Men can indulge this taste whenever their fancy 
may suggest, but ladies only in retired spots ; for, whenever 
a Turkish fair one removes the yas mak (veil) from her lips, 
as s!ie does to smoke, all around her must be harem (sacred). 

" Sometimes an eunuch stands guard at a little distance 
off, and if a stranger of the male sex approaches, gives a 
signal ; the pipe is held aside, while the mouth is kept 
covered by the veil, until the unexpected Acteon has passed 
by. But where the pipe plays the most important part is in 
the bath. It is well known that the Turkish ladies are 
accustomed to frequent the hommams assiduously, and to 
remain there for hours together. They enter the bath about 
eight o'clock in the morning; take their midday meal there, 
and return home between three and four in the afternoon. 
During these hours of leisure, the most agreeable in a Moham- 
medan woman's life, the pipe is their constant resource. In 
the middle of the warmest room is a round terrace-like 
elevation, called Gobek-tosh. 

"Here are clustered old and young, the snow white 
daughters of Circassia and the coal-black beauties of Soudan, 
and beguile the hours with never ending gossip, while 
around them rise the dense fumes of their pipes. Now one 
of the elders of the party tells a story, now a learned lady 
holds a discourse on religion, or extols the beauty and virtue 
of ' Aislia Fatima.' " 

The Fairy, or Dane's pipe is the most ancient form of the 
tobacco pipe used in Great Britain and of about the same 
size as the "Elfin pipes" of the Scottish peasantry. A great 
variety of pipes both in form and size have been found in 
the British Islands some of which are of ancient origin 
bearing dates prior to the Seventeenth Century. Some of 



148 EARLY MANUFACTURE OP PIPES. 

these ancient pipes are formed of very fine clay and although 
they held but a small quantity of tobacco were doubtless 
considered to be fine specimens in their time. 

The • manufacture of pipes commenced soon after the 
custom of using tobacco had become fashionable and soon 
after the Yirginians commenced its cultivation. Fairholt 
says: 

" The early period at which tobacco pipes were first manu- 
factured, is established by the fact that the incorporation of 
the craft of tobacco-pipe makers took place on the 5th of 
October, 1619. Their privileges extending through the 
cities of London and Westminster, the kingdom of England 



OLD ENGLISH PIPES. 



and dominion of Wales. They have a Master, four Wardens, 
and about twenty-four Assistants. They were first incorpo- 
rated by King James in his seventeenth year, confirmed 
again by King Charles I., and lastly on the twenty-ninth of 
April in the fifteenth year of King Charles II., in all the 
privileges of their aforesaid charters. 

"The London Company of Tobacco Pipe Makers was 
incorporated in the reign of Charles II (1663); it had no 
hall and no livery but was governed by a Master two wardens, 
and eighteen assistants. The first pipes used in the British 
Islands were made of silver while 'ordinary ones' were made 
of a walnut shell and a straw. Afterwards appeared the 
more common clay pipes in various forms and which are in 
use at the present time." 

During the reign of Anne and George I. the pipes assumed 
a difierent form and greater length so long were the stems of 
some of them that they were called yards of clay. The 
French pipe is one of the finest manufactured and is made of 
a fine red clay especially those made by Fiolet of St. Omer, 
one of the best designers of pipes. Man}* of these like 
German pipes are made of porcelain, adorned with portraits 



FRENCH PIPES. 149 

and landscapes. Others are made of rare kinds of wood 
turned in the lathe or artistically carved, and lined with clay 
to resist the action of fire. 

The French also make pipes of agate, amber, crystal, car- 
nelian and ivory, as well as the various kinds of pure or 
mixed metals. Many of the French and German pipes while 
they are beautiful in design and made of the most costly 
materials are often exceedingly grotesque, representing often 
the most ludicrous scenes and all possible attitudes. Many 
of them have been termed as satirical pipes taking off some 
public character a la Nast. 

Fairholt says of satirical pipes : 

"England has occasioned the production of one satirical 
pipe for sale among ourselves. The late Duke of Wellington 
toward the close of his life, took a strong dislike to the use of 
tobacco in the army, and made some ineffectual attempts to 
suppress it. Benda, a wholesale pij^e importer in the city 
employed Dumeril, of St. Omer, to commemorate the event, 
and the result was a pipe head, in which a subaltern, pipe in 
hand, quietly 'takes a sight' at the great commander who ia 
caricatured after a fashion that must have made the work a 
real pleasure to a Frenchman." Many of the French pipes 
are exceedingly quaint representing all manner of comical 
scenes. One is formed like a steam-engine the smoke pass- 




FRENCH PIPES, 



ing through the funnel. Another is fashioned after a potato 
or a turnip while others often represent some military 
subjects. In England and Ireland also pipes of a whimsical 
form are common. 




CHAPTER VII. 

PIPES AND SMOKEKS. (CONTINUED.) 

N Russia and Denmark as also in Norway and 
Sweden the pipes are more simple and are principally- 
formed of wood sometimes tipped with copper but 
usually of inferior material and work when compared 
with French and German pipes. The German pipes con- 
Bidered as works of art are doubtless the finest made. Many 
are made of meerschaum (sea foam). This material is found 
in various parts of Asia Minor. When first obtained it is 
capable of forming a lather like soap, and is used by the 
Tartars for washing purposes. The Turks use it for pipes 
which are made in the same way that pottery is and after- 
wards soaked in wax and is then ready for smoking. It heats 
slowly and is capable of greater absorption than any other 
material used in pipe making. To properly color a meer- 
Bchanm is now considered as one of the fine arts and when 
completed is considered quite a triumph. When the pipe 
takes on a rich deep brown tint it is considered a valuable 
pipe and is watched and guarded as a most valuable treasure. 
M. Ziegler thus describes the source whence the considerable 
annual supply of meerschaum for meerschaum pipes is 
derived : 

"Large quantities of this mineral so highly esteemed by 
smokers, comes from Hrubschitz and Oslavs^an in Austrian 
Moravia, where it is found embedded between thick strata of 
serpentine rock. It is also found in Spain at Esconshe, 
Yallecos, and Toledo ; the best however comes from Asia 
Minor. The chief places are the celebrated meerschauni 

150 



MEERSCHAUM PIPES. 151 

mines from six to eight miles southeast of Eskis chehr, on 
the river Pursak chief tributary to the river Sagarins. They 
were known to Xenophon, and are now worked principally 
by Armenian Christians, who sink narrow pits, to the beds 
of this mineral, and work the sides out until water or immi- 
nent danger drives them away to try another place. Some 
meerschaum comes from Brussa, and in 1869 over 3,000 
boxes of raw material were imported from Asia Minor at 
Trieste, with 345,000 florins. The pipe manufacture and 
carving is principally carried on in Vienna and in Rhula, 
Duchy of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha. The commercial value of 
meerschaum carving at these places may be estimated at 
$2,000,000 annually. However very large quantities of them 
are not made from genuine but artificial material. The 
waste from these carvings is ground to a very line powder, 
and then boiled with linseed oil and alum. When this 
mixture has sufficient cohesion, it is cast in molds and care- 
fully dried and carved, as if these blocks of mineral had been 
natural. It is said that about one-half of all pipes now sold 
are made from artificial meerschaum. Meerschaum is one of 
the lightest of minerals and it is said that in Italy bricks 
have been made of it so light that they would float on the 
top of the water. Some pipes (doubtless owing to the 
quality of meerschaum) take on more color in a given time 
than others this is owing in a great measure however to the 
thickness of the bowl." 

Pipe-colorers, who go around coloring pipes or meer- 
gchaums, pride themselves on the rapidity with which they 
are enabled to color a pipe. The following, on "Pipe 
Colorers," is from " The Tobacco Plant " : 

" There are men who pride themselves upon the skill with 
which they are able to color the pipes they smoke. Some of 
these are amateurs, who smoke Tobacco only with the view 
of gratifying that taste for color which is satisfied when a 
bowl of clay or meerschaum is sufficiently yellowed, browned, 
or blacked. There are men who care nothing for Tobacco 
of itself, and would be much more easily and rationally 
pleased were they to set their pipes upon an easel and paint 
tiiem with oils and camel's-hair. Others of the class are 
professional colorers, who hire themselves to pipe-sellers or 
connoisseurs by the week, or day, or hour, to smoke so many 
ounces or pounds of strong Tobacco through such and such 
pipes in such and such a time, with the view of causing such 



152 



COLORING MEERSCHAUMS. 




PIPE COLORER. 



and such stains of Tobacco-juice to make themselves visible 
on the bowls or stems of those specified pipes. These are 

mostly old, well -seasoned 
smokers, to whose existence 
the weed has become essen- 
tial; who smoke their own 
old pipes, which lack artistic 
coloring, in the intervals 
when they lay aside the 
pipes they are employed to 
color. Another and much 
smaller section of the class 
are those who smoke for 
I smoking's sake, and yet are 
weak enough to nurse some 
% special pipes for show. To 
such it is a joy to say, when 
friends are gathered at the 
festive board ' Look ! is not 
that well colored ? I colored 
it myself.' In such an age 
as this, when the learned cannot tell us which of our various 
branches of knowledge and inquiry are sciences and which 
are not, it may not seem a great anomaly that this pipe- 
coloring should, by some, be called ' an art.' Nor is it, when 
we think that there is such an ' art ' as blacking shoes ; and 
when we must perforce admit that he who, barber fashion, 
cuts our hair — and he who, cook-wise, broils the kidney for 
our mid-day dinner — is an artist. We have not come as yet 
to give this title to the weaver who watches the loom that 
weaves our stockings, or to the hammer-man who beats the 
red-hot horse-shoe on the anvil in a smithy ; but even there 
we designate ' artisans,' and ' artists ' may come next. So, 
hey ! for the art of coloring pipes ! 

" It may not be denied that there is beauty in a well-colored 
meerschaum ; but in the admission lies the contradiction of 
Keats' well-known line — 

" A thing of beauty is a joy for ever." 

For, your meerschaum is a fragile thing, and eminently fran- 
gible. This present writer once did see four beauties break 
within a single moon. And when they break, what previous 
joy of coloring can over-top the sorrow of their dire destruc- 
tion ? It is a singular difficulty in the way of those who 
most desire to beautify utility or utilize the beautiful, or 



THE CITY OF SMOKERS. 153 

show that beanty is most lovely when made practical, that 
these artistic colorers of pipes are always those who make 
least use of Tobacco, save for the immediate purpose of 
obtaining the clay in which it is smoked. Ask such an artist 
why he smokes, and he will scarcely tell you. His best rea- 
son certainly will be, that others smoke, and, as a custom, it 
becomes him. And when you find an ardent smoker — one 
who smokes because he likes Tobacco for itself, or finds it 
useful — who spends his time in tinting pipes, you will have 
found a vara avis^ or a monstrosity. Apart from taste, there 
are some practical objections to this custom of coloring pipes. 
Smoking, to be worthy, should be free and unrestrained ; 
while he who colors his pipe is tied by system and confined 
to rule. 

" A pipe to be enjoyable, should be its master's slave ; but 
he who keeps a ' well-colored ' pipe is slave thereto. He can- 
not smoke it as, or when, or where he will. He must not 
smoke it in a draught, or near a fire; he must not lay it 
down, or finger it ; he must not pufi' too fast, nor yet too 
slow. In short, he is the creature of this ' Joss ' — this home- 
made deity — to which he bows down and worships. The 
pipe-colorers are the Sabbatarians of smoking. Whereas, the 
pipe was made for man, they treat man as made for the pipe. 
And thus, as in all cases where the cart is expected to draw 
the horse, the economy of nature is reversed, and mischief is 
evolved." 

Dibdin, in his " Tour in France and Germany," says of 
Vienna, that it is a city of smokers, — "a good Austrian 
thinks he can never pay too much for a good pipe." Many 
of the Germans use a kind of pipe carved from the root of 
the dwarf oak; wooden pipes of a similar kind are made of 
brier root, and are very common, as are also those made from 
maple and sweet-brier. One of the favorite pipes used by 
Germans is the porcelain 
pipe, which consists of a 
double bowl — the upper 
one containing the to- 
bacco, which fits into 
another portion of the 
pipe, allowing the oil to ^^^^^^ porcelain pipes. 

drain into the lower bowl, 
which may be removed and the pipe cleaned. The bowls are 




154 "MY GREAT GRANDFATHER." 

Bometimes painted beautifully, representing a variety of sub- 
jects, and in no way inferior to the painted porcelain for the 
table. 

The Dutch are famous smokers and are constantly " pull- 
ing at the pipe." They use those with long, straight stems, 
and both their clay and porcelain pipes are of the finest form 
and finish. Irving, in " The History of New York from the 
Beginning of the "World to the End of the Dutch Dynasty," 
has given a good description of the smoking powers of the 
Dutch. Speaking of his grandfather's love for the weed, he 
says : 

"My great-grandfather, by the mother's side, Hermanns 
Yan Clattercop, when employed to build the large stone 
church at Rotterdam, which stands about three hundred 
yards to your left, after your turn from the Boomkeys; and 
which is so conveniently constructed that all the zealous 
Christians of Rotterdam prefer sleeping through a sermon 
there to any other church in the city. My great-grandfather, 
I say, when employed to build that famous church, did, in 
the first place, send to Delft for a box of long pipes ; then, 
having purchased a new spitting-box and a hundred weight 
of the best Virginia, he sat himself down and did nothing 
for the space of three months but smoke most laboriously. 

" Then did he spend full three months more in trudging on 
foot, and voyaging in the Trekschuit, from Rotterdam to 
Amsterdam — to Delft — to Harlem — to Leyden — to the 
Hague — knocking his head and breaking his pipe against 
every church in his road. Then did he advance gradually 
nearer and nearer to Rotterdam, until he came in full sight 
of the identical spot whereon the church was to be built. 
Then did he spend three months longer in walking round it 
and round it, contemplating it, first from one point of view, 
and then from another, — now would he be paddled by it on 
the canal — now would he peep at it through a telescope from 
the other side of the Mouse, and now would he take a bird's- 
eye glance at it from the top of one of those gigantic wind- 
mills which protect the gates of the city. 

" The good folks of the place were on the tip-toe of expec- 
tation and impatience. Notwithstanding all the turmoil of 
my great-grandfather, not a symptom of the church was yet 
to be seen ; they even began to fear it would never be 
brought into the world, but that its great projector would lie 



HUDSON AS A SMOKER. I55 

down and die in labor of the mighty plan he had conceived. 
At length, having occupied twelve good months in puffing 
and paddling, and talking and walking, — having traveled 
over all Holland, and even taken a peep into France and 
Germany, — having smoked five hundred and ninety-nine 
pipes and three hundred weight of the best Virginia 
tobacco, — my great-grandfather gathered together all that 
knowing and industrious class of citizens who prefer attend- 
ing to anybody's business sooner than their own, and having 
pulled off his coat and five pair of breeches he advanced 
sturdily up and laid the corner-stone of the church, in the 
presence of the whole multitude, — ^just at the commence- 
ment of the thirteenth month." 

He also alludes to Hudson whom he says was : 
" A seafaring man of renown, who had learned to smoke 
tobacco under Sir Walter Raleigh, and is said to have been 
the first to introduce it into Holland, which gained him 
much popularity in that country, and caused him to find 
great favor in their High Mightinesses, the lords and states 
general, and also of the honorable West India Company. 
He was a short, square, brawny old gentleman, with a double 
chin, a mastiff mouth, and a broad copper nose, which was 
supposed in those days to have acquired its fiery hue from the 
constant neighborhood of his tobacco pipe. * * * As 
chief mate and favorite companion, the commander chose 
Master Robert Juet, of Limehouse, in England. By some 
his name has been spelled Chewit, ascribed to the circum- 
stance of his having been the first man that ever chewed 
tobacco. * * * * Under every misfortune he comforted 
himself with a quid of tobacco, and the truly philosophical 
maxim, * that it will be all the same a hundred years hence ! ' " 
Further on he alludes to the attempt to subjugate New 
Amsterdam to the British crown and the effect produced by 
the burghers lighting their pipes. " When " he says " Cap- 
tain Argol's vessel hove in sight, the worthy burghers were 
seized with such a panic, that they fell to smoking their pipes 
with astonishing vehemence, insomuch that they quickly 
raised a cloud, which, combining with the surrounding woods 
and marshes, completely enveloped and concealed their 
beloved village ; and overhung the fair regions of Pavonia : — 
so that the terrible Captain Argol passed on, totally unsus- 
picious that a sturdy little Dutch settlement lay snugly 
couched in the mud, under cover of all this pestilent vapor." 



156 



PERSIAN WATER PIPES. 




A PERSIAN WATER PIPB. 



The Persians * are said to be the first to invent the mode 
of drawing tobacco smoke through water thereby cooling it 

before inlialing it. Fair- 
holt says " it is to smoking 
what ice is to Champagne." 
The London Review gives 
the following description 
of pipes and smoking 
apparatus : 

" The hookah of India is 
the most splendid and glit- 
tering of all pipes ; it is a 
large aiFair, on account of 
the arrangements for caus- 
ing the smoke to pass 
through water before it 
reaches the 1 i p s of the 
smoker, as a means of ren- 
dering it cooler and of ex- 
tracting from it much of its rank and disagreeable flavor. 

" On the top of an air-tight vessel, half tilled with water, is 
a bowl containing tobacco ; a small tube descends from the 
bowl into the water, and a flexible pipe, one end of which ia 
between the lips of the smoker, is inserted at the other 
end into the vessel, above the level of the water. Such 
being the adjustment, the philosophy of the inhalation 
may be easily understood. The smoke sucks the air out of 
the vessel, and makes a partial vacuum ; the external air, 
pressing on the burning tobacco, drives the smoke through 
the small tube into the water beneath ; purified from some of 
its rank qualities, the smoke bubbles up into the vacant part 
of the vessel above the water, and passes through the flexible 
pipe to the smoker's mouth. Sometimes the affair is made 
still more luxurious by substituting rose-M^ater for water jt??//* 
et simple. The tube is so long and flexible that the smoker 
may sit (or squat) at a small or great distance from the vessel 
containing the water. In the courts of princes and wealthy 
natives the vessels and tubes are lavishly adorned with 
precious metals. One mode of showing hospitality in the 

*Sandy8, writing in 1610 narrates a Persian legend to the effect tlat Shiraz tobacco wa» 
given by a holy man to a virtuous youth, disconsolate at the loss of his loving wife. " Go to 
thy wife's tomb," saicl the anchorite, " and there thou wilt find a weed. Pluck it, place it ia 
a reed, and inhale the smoive, aa you put fire to it. This will be to you wife, mother, father 
and brotlier," continued the holy man, in Homeric strain, "and above all, will be s wise 
counsellor, and teach thy soul wisdom and thy spirit joy." 



TURKISH PIPES. 157 

East is to place a hookah in the center of the apartment, 
range the guests around, and let all have a whiff of the pipe 
in turn ; but in more luxurious establishments a separate 
hookah is placed before each guest. Some of the Egyptians 
use a form of hookah called the narghile or nargeeleh — so 
named because the water is contained in the shell of a cocoa- 
nut of which the Arabic name is nargeeleh. Another kind, 
having a glass vessel, is called the sheshee — having, like the 
other, a very long tube. Only the choicest tobacco is used 
with the hookah and nargeeleh ; it is grown in Persia. 

" Before it is used, the tobacco is washed several times, and 
put damp into the pipe-bowl, two or three pieces of live 
charcoal are put on the top. The moisture gives mildness to 
the tobacco, but renders inhalation so difficult that weak 
lungs are unfitted to bear it. The dry tobacco preferred by 
the Persians does not involve so much difficulty in ' blowing 
a cloud.' " 

TUKKISH CHIBOUQUES AND WOOD PIPES. 

" The stiff-stemmed Turkish pipes, quite different from the 
flexible tube of the hookah and narghile, are of two kinds, 
the kablioun or long pipe, and the chibouque or short pipe. 
Some of the stems of the kablioun, made of cherry tree, jas- 
mine, wild plum, and ebony, are five feet in length, and are 
bored with a kind of gimlet. The workman, placing the 
gimlet above the long, slender branchlet of wood, bores half 
the length, and then reverses the position to operate upon 
the other half. The wild cherry tree wood, which is the 
most frequently employed, is seldom free from defects in 
the bark, and some skill is exercised in so repairing these 
defective places that the mending shall be invisible." 

The tubes or pipe-bowls used with these stems are mostly 
a combination of two substances — the red clay of Nisli and 
the white earth of Rustchuk ; they are graceful in form and 
sometimes decorated with gilding. It is characteristic of 
some of the Turks that they estimate the duration of a 
journey, and with it the distance traveled, by the number of 
pipes smoked, a particular size of pipe-bowl being understood. 
Dodwell, in his " Tour through Greece," says that " a Turk 
is generally very clean in his smoking apparatus, having a 
small tin dish laid on the carpet of his apartment, on which 
the bowl of the pipe can rest, to prevent the tobacco from 



158 PIPE STEMS. 

burning or soiling the carpet. The tubes of the kabliouns 
are often as much as seven or eight feet long. Some of the 
gardens of Turkey and Greece contain jasmine trees pur- 
posely cultivated to produce straight stems for these pipes." 

Of those Turkish pipes which are used in Egypt, Mr. Lane, 
after mentioning the narghile and the chibouque or " shibuk," 
says : — 

" The most common kind used in Egypt is made of wood 
called garmashak (I believe it is maple). The greater part 
of the stick, from the mouth-piece to three-fourths of its 
length, is covered with silk, which is confined at each extremity 
by gold thread, often intertwined with colored silks, or by a 
tube of gilt or silver ; and at the lower extremity of the cover- 
ing is a tassel of silk. The covering was originally designed 
to be moistened with water in order to cool the pipe, and 
consequently the smoke by evaporation ; but this is only done 
when the pipe is old or not handsome. These stick pipes 
are used by many persons, particularly in winter ; in summer 
the smoke is not so cool from them as from the kind before 
mentioned. The bowl is of baked earth, colored red or 
brown." 

AUSTRIAN AND HUNGAEIAN PIPE STEMS. 

Before passing to the subject of the costly mouth-pieces of 
Oriental pipes, we must say a few words concerning the 
extraordinary care bestowed on some kinds of plain wood 
sticks for stems or tubes. Cherry-tree stems, under the name 
of agriots, constitute a specialty of Austrian manufacture. 
The fragrant cherry (prunus makaleb) is a native of that 
country ; and the young trees are cultivated with special ref- 
erence to this application. They are all raised from seed. 
The seedlings, when two years old, are planted in small pots, 
one in each ; as they grow, every tendency to branching is 
choked by removing the bud ; and as they increase in size 
from year to year, they are shifted into larger pots or into 
boxes. Great care is taken to turn them round daily, so that 
every part shall be equally exposed to sunshine. Wiien the 
plants have attained a sufficient height they are allowed to 
form a small bushy head ; but the daily care is continued 
until the stems grow to a proper thickness. They are then 



AMBER MOUTH-PIECES. 159 

taken out of the ground, the roots and branches removed, 
and the stem bored through after being seasoned for some 
time. The care shown in rearing insures a perfect straight- 
ness of stem, and an equable diameter of about an inch or 
an inch and a half. The last specimens, when cut from the 
tree, are as much as eight feet in length, dark purple-brown in 
color, and highlj fragrant. At Pesth are made pipes about 
eighteen inches in length, of the shoots of the mock orange, 
remarkable for their quality in absorbing the oil of tobacco, 
they are flexible without being weak. The French make 
elegant pipe-bowls of the root of the tree-heath, but their 
chief attention is directed, as far as concerns wood pipes, to 
those of brier-root, which are made by them in large quanti- 
ties. The bowl and the short stems are carried out of one 
piece, and the wood is credited with absorbing some of the 
rank oil of tobacco. 

Amber — the only kind of resin that rises to the dignity of 
a gem — is unfitted for the bowl of a tobacco-pipe, because it 
cannot well bear the heat ; but it is largely used for mouth- 
pieces, especially by wealthy Oriental smokers. The Turks 
have a belief that amber wards off infection; an opinion 
which, whether right or wrong, tells well for the amber 
workers. There has always been a mystery connected with 
this remarkable substance. So far back as the Phenicians, 
amber was picked up on the Baltic shore of what is now 
called Prussia ; and the same region has ever since been the 
chief store-house for it. Tacitus was not far wrong when he 
conjectured that amber is a gum or resin exuded from certain 
trees, although other authorities have preferred a theory that 
it is a kind of wax or fat which has undergone slow petrifac- 
tion. At any rate, it must at one time have been liquid or 
semi-liquid ; for insects, flies, detached wings and legs, and 
small fragments of various kinds, are often found imbedded 
in it — those odds and ends of which Pope said : — 

" The things, we know, are neither rich nor rare; 
The wonder's how the devil they got there !" 



160 



OBTAINING AMBER. 



Whether new stores of amber are now being formed, or 
whether, like coal, it was the result of causes not now in 
operation, is an unsolved problem. The specimens obtained 
differ considerably ; some are pale as primrose, some deep 
orange or almost brown ; some nearly as transparent as crys- 
tal, some nearly opaque. Large pieces, uniform in color and 
translucency, fetch high prices; and there are fashions in 
this matter for which it is not easy to account, — seeing that 
the Turks and other Orientals buy up, at prices which Euro- 
peans are unwilling to give, all the specimens presenting a 
straw-yellow color and a sort of cloudy translucency. The 
Russians, on the contrary, prefer orange-yellow transparent 
specimens. The amber is seldom obtained by actual mining. 
It is usually found on sea-coasts, after storms, in rounded 
nodules ; or, if scarce on shore, it is sought for by men clad 
in leather garments, who wade up to their necks in the sea, 
and scrape the sea-bottom with hooped nets attached to the 

end of long poles ; 
or (rather danger- 
ous work) men go 
out in boats, and 
examine the faces 
of precipitous cliffs, 
picking off, by 
means of iron 
hooks, the lumps 
of amber which 
the}^ may see here 
and there. Some- 
times a piece 
weighing nearly a pound is found, and a weight of even ten 
pounds is recorded. As small pieces can easily be joined 
by smoothing the surfaces, moistening them with linseed oil, 
and pressing them together over a charcoal fire, and as gum 
copal is sometimes very like amber, there is much sophistica- 
tion indulged in, which none but an expert can guard against. 
In fashioning the nodules of amber, whether genuine or 




SEARCHING FOR AMBER. 



ITS VALUE. iQi 

fictitious, into pipe mouth-pieces, they are split on a leaden 
plate in a turning lathe, smoothed into shape by whet-stones, 
rubbed with chalk and water, and polished with a piece of 
flannel. It is an especially difficult kind of work ; for unless 
the amber is allowed frequent intervals for cooling, it 
becomes electrically excited by the friction and shivers into 
fragments ; the men, too, are put into nervous tremors if 
kept too long at work at one time. Amber is one of the 
most electrically excitable of all known substances ; in fact, 
the name electricity itself was derived from electron, the 
Greek name for amber. Hookahs, chibouques, narghiles, 
meerschaums, all are largely adorned with amber mouth- 
pieces. The mouth-piece often consists of two or three 
pieces of amber, interjoined with ornaments of gold and 
gems ; it is in such case the most costly part of the pipe. 

At one of the greater industrial exhibitions four Turkish 
amaraes, or amber mouth-pieces, were shown, illustrating 
clearly enough the value attached to choice specimens; two 
of them were worth £350 each, two £200 each, diamond 
studded. The Turkish and Persian pipes have often a small 
wooden tube inside the amber mouth-piece. They require 
frequent cleaning with a long wire and a bit of tow, and in 
some large towns there are professional pipe-cleaners. 

The natives of British Guiana have a curious kind of pipe, 
made of the rind of the fruit of the areca-palm, coiled up 
into a kind of cheroot, with an internal hollow to hold the 
tobacco. The poorer Hindoos make a simple pipe of two 
pieces of bamboo, — one cut close to a knot for the bowl, and 
a more slender piece for the tube. A lower class of natives 
in India make two holes of unequal length, with a piece of 
stick, in a clay soil ; the holes are unequally inclined so as to 
meet at the bottom ; the tobacco is placed in the shorter 
hole, and the smoker, applying his mouth to the longer, 
inhales the fumes in this primitive fashion. The pipes used 
for opium-smoking in various parts of the East have small 
bowls ; the drug is too costly to be used otherwise than in 
email portions at a time, and too powerful to need more than 
11 



162 VARIETY OF PIPES. 

a few wbifEs to produce the opium-smoker's drearj delirium. 
The Tunisians use reeds for pipes. Stone pipes are found 
among the natives of Vancouver; while Strong Bow, tlie 
Korth American Indian chief, has his long wooden pipe of 
peace, decked out with tassels and fringes, but with an 
ominous-looking sharp steel cutting instrument near the end 
most remote from the bowl. 

Chinese, Japanese, Phillipine Islanders, Madagascans, Cen- 
tral Africans, Algerine Arabs, Mexicans, Paraguayans, 
Siamese, Tahitians, South American Indians, Mongols, 
Malays, Tartars, Turcomans, as well as the nations of Europe 
and the chief nations of Southern Asia, all have their smok- 
ing'pipes, plain or ornate, as the case may be, and made of 
wood, reeds, bamboo, bone, ivory, stone, earthenware, glass, 
porcelain, amber, agate, jade, precious metals and common 
metals, according to the civilization of the country and the 
pecuniary means of the smoker. 

" The French clay pipes have quite a special character ; 

they are well made, and 
great ingenuity is shown 
in the preparation of the 
moulds in which they are 
pressed ; but being mostly 
intended for a class of 
purchasers who prefer 
grotesque ideas to refined 
taste, the bowls are often ornamented with queer shaped 
heads, having bead-like eyes; sometimes imaginary beings, 
sometimes caricature portraits of eminent persons. Where 
more than the head is represented, license is given to a 
certain grossness of idea ; but this is not a general charac- 
teristic. The clay of which these French pipes are made is 
admitted to be superior to that of England, due to the careful 
mixture of difiereut kinds, and to skilful manipulation. 

"We need not say much about Dutch pipes as distinct 
articles of manufacture, because the process adopted in their 
production are pretty much like those in use elsewhere. 
The Dutch are famous clay-pipe smokers, not countenancing 
the cigar so much as their neighbors the Belgians, nor tlie 
meerschaum so largely as their German neighbors on the 
Khine irontier. A notable bit of sharp practice is on record 




FANCY PIPES. 



HISTORY OF PIPES. 163 

in connexion with the pipe-smolcers of Holland — a dodge 
only to be justified on the equivocal maxim that all is fair in 
trade provided it just keeps within the margin we need not 
6pe^dc. A pipe manufactory was established in Flanders 
about the middle of the last century. 

"The Dutch makers, alarmed at the competition which this 
threatened, cunningly devised a stratagem for nipping it in 
the bud. They freighted a large worn-out ship with an 
enormous quantity of pipes of their own make, sent it to 
Ostend, and wrecked it there. By the municipal laws of 
that city the wreck became public property ; the pipes were 
sold at prices so ridiculously low that the town was glutted 
with the commodity ; the new Flemish factory was thereby 
paralyzed, ruined, and closed. 

The Turks (especially those of the lower orders) use a 
kind of clay pipe made of red earth decorated with gilding. 
The stem of the pipe is made from a branch of jasmine, 
cherry tree or maple and is sufficiently long to rest on the 
floor when used by the smoker. A writer in the Tobacco 
Plant says of Old English Clay pipes : 

" Of all the various branches of the subject of tobacco, 
that of the history of pipes is one of the most interesting, 
and one that deserves every attention that can possibly be 
given. Whether considered ethnographically, historically, 
geographically, or archseologically, pipes present food for 
speculation and research of at least equal importance to any 
other set of objects that can be brought forward. Some 
brandies of the subject have already been treated in these 
columns, and others, in what is intended shall follow, will 
hereafter be discussed. The present article will be devoted 
to ' Fairy Pipes ' and the history of the earliest pipes of this 
country. Smoking is an old and venerable institution in 
this kingdom of ours, and dates far back beyond the intro- 
duction of tobacco to our shores. Long before Sir Walter 
Raleigh was thought of, there is reason to believe herbs and 
leaves of one kind or other — coltsfoot, yarrow, mouse-lax, 
sword-grass, dandelion, and other plants, and even dried 
cow-dung — were smoked for one ailment or other, and in 
some instances for relaxation and pleasure, and thus, no 
doubt, became habitually used. These are still, in some of 
our rural districts, smoked by people as cures for various 
ailments, and are considered not only highly efficacious but 
very pleasant. I have known these or other herbs smoked 




164 ANCIENT HABIT OF SMOKINa, 

tlirongli a stick from which the pith had been removed, the 
bowl being formed of a kimp of clay moulded by the lingers 

at the time, and 
baked in the house- 
hold fire. 

"The small branch 
es of the elder tree, oi 
sometimes the stem 
o f the briar and 
bramble, are what I 
have seen used, but 
CLAY AND REED PIPES. Gvon tho stom of the 

hemlock and keckse 
are sometimes brought into requisiton for the purpose, 

" 1 believe that long before the time Dr. Wilson states on 
the authority of Sharpe, that it was common within memory, 
for the old wives of Annandale to smoke a dried white moss 
gathered on the neighboring moors, which they declared to 
be much sweeter than tobacco, and to have been in use 
long before the American weed was heard of ; before Sir 
Walter Raleigh wooed and won Elizabeth Throgmorton, or 
Sir Richard Granville voyaged to Virginia with Masters 
Ralph Layne, Thomas Candish, John Arundell, Master 
Stukely, Breniize, Vincent, Heryot, and John Clarke; before 
Sir Francis Drake made his first voyage, or the Spanish 
Armada was dreamed of; before Sir John Hawkins, Captain 
Price, Coft, Keat or others for whom the honor of the 
introduction of tobacco has been claimed, drew breath — 
smoking was to some extent indulged in by our forefathers 
and (still medicinally, of course) in this country. In mediae- 
val times, when the Ceramic art was but little practiced, and 
when all the domestic vessels that were produced were of 
the rudest and coarsest character both in material, form, and 
decoration, it is not to be expected that pipes for the smok- 
ing of herbs would be manufactured as a n)atter of sale, and 
tliose of the people who wished ior such an indulgence would 
naturally be thrown on their own primitive resources such as 
I have described, for instruments for the purpose. 

"A portion of a very rude pipe-head, formed of common 
red clay — a lump of clay moulded by hand, and ornamented 
with small circles pres-ed into it as from the end of a stick — 
has come under my notice, as have also others of an equally 
primitive character, found in different parts of this kingdnm. 
These I have no hesitation in ascribing to a pre-Raleigh 



FAIRY PIPES. 165 

period. It is not to these, however, but to the small pipes 
formerly used in this kingdom for smoking tobacco, and 
tobacco alone, that I wish to draw attention. Most people, 
especially in the Midland and Northern counties of England, 
as well as in Scotland and Ireland, will have heard the name 
of Fairy Pipes applied to the small, old-fashioned, and some- 
times oddly-shaped tobacco pipes which are not infreqnently 
turned up in digging and plowing and other operations. To 
these and the general forms of old English pipes, I purpose 
confining myself in the present article. Many years ago I 
collected together a large number of these 'Fairy Pipes' 
from all parts of the kingdom. Since then, my own researches 
have, with the aid of inquiries carried on for me, enabled 
me to bring forward many interesting points, so as to verify 
dates of manufacture and more fully to carry out their classi- 
fication. Like their Irish brethren and sisters, English people 
were formerly apt to ascribe everything unusually small 
to the fairies, and anything out of the common way to the 
people of very remote ages. 

" Thus, these small pipes are commonly in England called 
* fairy pipes,' or ' Carl's pipes,' or ' old man's pipes ;' in Ire- 
land, where they are likewise known as ' fairj^ pipes,' they 
are also called ' Dane's pipes ;' and in Scotland, where tlieir 
common name is ' elf pipes,' or ' elfin pipes,' they are, in like 
manner, known as ' Celtic pipes.' They are also sometimes 
named ' Mab pipes,' or ' Queen's pipes,' from the same fairy 
majesty. Queen Mab. Thus, while in each country they are 
ascribed to the elfin race — the 'small people' of Cornish 
folk-lore — their secondary names attach to them a popular 
belief in their extreme antiquity. Anything apparently old 
is at once, by the Irish, set down to the ' Danes;' by the Scots 
to the ' Celts ;' and by people in the rural districts of our own 
country to the 'carls,' or 'old men' — carl being indicative of 
extreme antiquity. In Ireland, the pipes are believed to 
have belonged to the cluricaunes — a kind of wild, ungovern- 
able, mischievous fairy-demon — who were held in aNve l»y the 
*pisantry ;' and whenever found, these pipes were, with much 
Buperstitious feeling, immediately broken up, so as to destroy 
and break up the spell their finding might have cast around 
the finder. But it was not only among the peasantry that 
this belief in the extreme antiquity of tobacco pipes existed. 

"Serious essays were written to prove tlieir pre-historic 
origin, and to claim for them a history that in our day reads 
as arrant nousense. In 1784, a short pipe was asserted to 




FAIRY PIPES. 



166 BURIED PIPES. 

have been found between the jaws of the sknll of an ancient 
Milesian exhumed at Bannockstown, county Kildare. Upon 
this discovery, an elaborate and learned paper was written in 
the ' Authologia Hibernica,' setting forth this pipe as a 
proof of the use of tobacco in Ireland long before that coun- 
try was invaded by the Danes. This pipe has been proved 
by comparison to be probably quite late in the reign of 
Elizabeth. They also have a more modern pipe, the stem of 
which describes one or more circles, while another is tied in 
a knot, yet allows a free passage of air. At another time, 

in opening an Anglo-Saxon 
grave mound, some of the 
men employed came across 
a fairy pipe which evidently 
had rolled down from among 
the surface-soil, and, being 
turned out in juxtaposition 
with undoubted Anglo-Saxon remains, was immediately set 
down by the learned director of the proceedings as a relic of 
that period. At another time I had brought to me, as a 
great curiosity, two ' Roman pipes,' as I was informed — the 
linders jumping to the conclusion that because they had dug 
them up at little Chester (the Koman station Derventio), they 
must be Roman pipes ! I believe they expected to receive a 
large sum from these relics : how grievously they were dis- 
appointed I need not tell. Instances of this kind are far 
from rare. 

" I remember a man once bringing me some fragments of 
Roman pottery and other things of the same period, which 
he had turned up in the course of excavations, and among 
them was a Tobacco stopper formed of a Sacheverell medal ! 
and a George II. half-penny, all of which he was ready to 
Bwear he had found " all of a heap together," inside a hypo- 
caust tile, which, on examination, certainly had remained in. 
situ from Romano-British times ! The cupidity of a man 
had evidently led him to collect together these odds and 
ends, and try to turn them to profitable account. Some 
twenty 3'ears ago, a large number of " elfin pipes " were dug 
np at Bomington, near Edinburgh, along with a quantity of 
placks or bodies of James VI., which thus gave trustworthy 
evidence of their true date. Others were found in the 
ancient cemetery at North Berwick, adjoining to which is a 
small Romanesque building of the Twelfth Century, close 
upon the shore. Within the last half-century, the sea has 



JASMINE PIPES. 1C7 

mado very great inroads upon this ancient "bnrial-place, 
carrying off a considerable ruin, and exposing the skeletons, 
and bringing to light many interesting relics at almost every 
spring-tide. Among these, many pipes have been washed 
down. A similar circumstance has occurred on the seashore 
at Hoy Lake, Cheshire, where several " fairy pipes " have 
been found. 

*' Notices of several discoveries occur. Dr. Wilson says, in 
the statistical accounts of Scotland, many of which are sug- 
gestive of a pre-Raleigh period. Thus, ' in an ancient British 
encampment in the parish of Kirk Michael, Dumfriesshire, 
on the farm of Gilrig, a number of pipes of burnt clay were 
dug up, with heads smaller than the modern tobacco-pipes, 
swelled at the middle and straighter at the top. Again, in 
the vicinity of a group of standing stones at Cairney Mount, 
in the parish of Carluke Lanarkshire, a celt or stone hatchet, 
elfin bolts (flint and bone arrow-heads), elfin pipes, numerous 
coins of the Edwards and of later date, and other things are 
all stated to have been found.' An example is also recorded 
of the discovery of a tobacco-pipe in sinking a pit for coal, 
at Misk, in Ayrshire, after digging through many feet of 
sand, AH these notes are pregnant with significant warn- 
ings of the necessity for cautious discrimination in determin- 
ing the antiquity of such buried relics." 

In Turkey the jasmine is cultivated for the purpose of 
pipe smoking. Barillet describes the growing of the com- 
mon jasmine near Constantinople. He says : 

"The object sought is a long straight stem, free from 
leaves and side branches. For this purpose the plants are 
grown quickly in a rich soil, and drawn up by being grown 
in a sheltered situation, to which the sun has little access at 
the sides, but only at the top. Pinching is resorted to, and 
during the second year's growth one end of a thread is 
attached to the top of the jasmine stem. This thread passes 
over a pulley attached to the post to which this jasmine is 
trained, and from it is suspended a weight, the cftect of 
which is to keep the stem always in a vertical direction. 
When the jasmine stem is about two centimeters (say three 
quarters of an inch) in diameter a cloth is wrapped around 
it to prevent access of dust and of the sun's rays. Twice or 
thrice in the year the stem is washed with citron-water, 
which is said to give the clear color so much esteemed. 
When the stem has acquired a length of some fifteen feet, it 



168 SMOKING IN ALGIERS. 

is cut down and perforated by the workmen, and fitted with. 
a terra-cotta bow and an amber mouth-piece." 

Blackburn, in his work entitled "Artists and Arabs," givea 
the following picture of life and manners in Algiers : — 

" There is one difficulty here, however, for the artist — that 
of finding satisfactory models. You can get one at last, and 
here is her portrait. Her costume, when she throws off her 
haik (and with it a tradition of the Mohammedan faith, that 
forbids her to show her face to an unbeliever), is a rich, 
loose, crimson jacket embroidered with gold, a thin white 
bodice, loose silk trousers reaching to the knee and fastened 
round the waist by a magnificent sash of various colors, red 
morocco slippers, a profusion of rings on her little fingers, 
and bracelets and anklets of gold filagree work. Through 




FEMALE SMOKING IN ALGIERS. 



her waving black hair are twined strings of coins and the 
folds of a silk handkerchief, the hair falling at the back in 
plaits below the waist. She is not beautiful, she is scarcely 
interesting in expression, and she is decidedly unsteady. She 
Beems to have no more power of keeping herself in one posi- 
tion or of remaining in one j^art of the room, or even of being 
quiet, than a humming-top. The whole thing is an unutter- 
able bore to her, for she does not even reap the reward — her 
father, or husband, or other male attendant always taking 
the money. She is petite, constitutionally phlegmatic, and 
as fat as her parents can manage to make her ; she has small 



SMOKING IN AFRICA. 169 

hands and feet, large rolling ej^es — the latter made to appear 
artificially large by the application of henna or antimony 
black ; her attitudes are not ungraceful, but there is a want 
of character about her, and an utter abandonment to the 
situation, peculiar to all her race. In short, her movements 
are more suggestive of a little caged animal that had better 
be petted and caressed, or kept at a safe distance, according 
to her humor. She does one thing — she smokes incessantly, 
and makes cigarettes with a skill and rapidity which are 
wonderful. Her age is thirteen, and she has been married 
six months ; her ideas appear to be limited to three or four, 
and her pleasures, poor creature, are equally circumscribed. 
She had scarcely ever left her father's house, and had never 
spoken to a man until her marriage. There seems to be in 
the Moorish nature a wonderful sense of harmony and con- 
trasts of color. Two Orientals will hardly walk down a 
street side by side unless the colors of their costumes har- 
monize. You find a negress selling oranges or citrons; an 
Arab boy with red fez and white turban, carrying purple 
fruit in a basket of leaves — always the right juxtaposition of 
colors. The sky furnishes them a superb background of deep 
blue, and the repose of these solemn Orientals, who sit here 
like bronze statues, save that they smoke incessantly^, inspires 
jou with a curious respect. They are men who believe in 
fate — what need that they should make haste?" 

In Africa the pipes are made of clay and horn, and are 
mostly rude affairs, but well suited to their ideas of imple- 
ments used for holding tobacco. King gives the following 
description of smoking among them : — 

"A party of headmen and older warriors, seated cross- 
legged in their tents, ceremoniously smoked the daghapipe, 
a kind of hookah, made of bullock's horn, its downward 
point filled with water, and a reed stem let into the side, 
surmounted by a rough bowl of stone, which is filled with 
the dagha, a species of hemp, very nearly, if not the same, as 
the Indian bang. Each individual receives it in turn, opens 
his jaws to their full extent, and placing his lips to the wide 
mouth of the hurn, takes a few pulls and passes it on. 
Retaining the last draught of smoke in his mouth, which he 
fills with a decoction of bark and water from a calabash, he 
squirts it on the ground by his side through a long ornamented 
tube in his left hand, performing thereon, by the aid of a 
reserved portion of the liquid, a sort of boatswain's whistle, 




170 DEFENCE OP SMOKING. 

complacently regarding the soap-like bubbles, the joint pro- 
duction of himself and neighbor. It appeared to be a sign 
of special friendliness and kindly feeling to squirt into the 
same hole." 

We give an engraving of a kind of pipe used by the 
natives of interior Africa. It is made of clay, and holds but 
a small portion of the weed. The natives are great smokers 

and indulge in it ahnost 
constantly, but their love 
for it can hardly exceed 
that of the more hardy 
Laplanders, who are 
AFRICAN PIPE. described as " passion- 

ately fond of the plant." 
Nothing is so indispensable as tobacco to their existence. A 
Laplander who cannot get Tobacco sucks chips of a barrel or 
pieces of anything else which has contained it. Tobacco 
gives the Laplanders a pleasure which often rises to ecstacy. 
They both chew and smoke, and they are certainly the dirti- 
est chewers in the world. When they chew they spit in 
their hands, then raise them to their nose that they may 
inhale from the saliva the irritating principles of the plant. 
Tims they satisfy two senses at the same time. They regu- 
larly smoke after their meals. If their supply of Tobacco 
falls short, they sit down in a circle and pass the pipe round, 
80 that every one in his turn may have a whifF.* 

"A Painter's Camp in the Highlands" defends the custom 
of smoking in the following well chosen words : 

"People who don't smoke — especially ladies — are exceed- 
ingly unfair and unjust to those who do. The reader has, I 
daresay, amongst his acquaintances ladies who, on hearing 
any habitual cigar-smoker spoken of, are always ready to 
exclaim against the enormity of such an expensive and use- 
less indulgence; and the cost of Tobacco-smoking is generally 
cited by its enemies as one of the strongest reasons for its 
general discontinuance. One would imagine, to hear these 

♦Reynard, In his "Trarels In Lapland," itijs of the nse of tobacco: "We Interroffated our 
Laplander upon many subjects. We asked him what he had given his wife at thrir mr-rriage. 
He told us that she had been very expensive to him during hia courtship, having cost him 
twg pounds weight of tobacco and four or five pints of brandy." 



TEA AND TOBACCO. 17X 

people talk, that smoking was the only selfish indnlgence in 
the world. When people argue in this strain, I immediately 
assume the offensive. I roll back the tide of war right into 
the enemy's intrenched camp of comfortable customs ; I 
attack the expensive and unnecessary indulgences of ladies 
and gentlemen who do not smoke. I take cigar-smoking as 
an expense of, say, half-a-crown a-day, and pipe-smoking at 
threepence. 

"I then compare the cost of these indulgences with the 
cost of other indulgences not a whit more necessary, which 
DO one ever questions a man's right to if he can pay for 
them. There is luxurious eating, for instance. A woman 
who has got the habit of delicate eating will easily consume 
dainties to the amount of half-a-crown a-day, which cannot 
possibly do her any good beyond the mere gratification of 
the palate. And there is the luxury of carriage-keeping, iu 
many instances very detrimental to the health of women, by 
entirely depriving them of the use of their legs. Now, you 
cannot keep a carriage a-going quite as cheaply as a pipe. 
Many a fine meerschaum keeps up its cheerful fire on a 
Bhilling a-week. I am not advocating a sumptuary law to 
put down carriages and cookery ; I desire only to say that 
people who indulge in these expensive and wholly superfiu- 
ous luxuries, have no right to be so hard on smokers for 
their indulgence. 

" Nearly every gentleman who drinks good wine at all will 
drink the value of half-a-crown a-day. Tlie ladies do not 
blame him for this. Half-a-dozen glasses of good wine are 
not thought an extravagance in any man of fair means, but 
women exclaim when a man spends the same amount in 
smoking cigars. The French habit of coffee-drinking and 
the English habit of tea-drinking are also cases in point. 
They are quite as expensive as ordinary Tobacco-smoking, 
and, like it, defensible only on the ground of the pleasurable 
sensation they communicate to the nervous system. But 
these habits are so universal that no one thinks of attacking 
them, unless now and then some persecuted smoker in self- 
defence. 

" Tea and tobacco are alike seductive, delicious, and dele- 
terious. The two indulgences will, perhaps, become equally 
necessary to the English world. It is high treason to the 
English national feeling to say a word against tea, which is 
now so universally recognized as a national beverage that 
people forget it comes from China, and that it is both alien. 



172 CHINESE PIPES. 

and heathen. Still, I mean no offence when I put tea in the 
same category with Tobacco. Now, who thinks of lecturing 
"US on the costliness of tea? And yet it is a mere superfluity. 
The habit of taking it as we do is unknown across the 
Channel, and was quite unknown amongst ourselves a very 
little time ago, when English people were no less proud of 
themselves and their customs than they are now, and perhaps 
with equally good reason. A friend of mine tells me that 
he smokes every day, at a cost of about sixpence a-week. 
JN'Ow, I would like to know in what other way so much 
enjoyment is to be bought for sixpence. Fancy the satisfac- 
tion of spending sixpence a-week in wine ! It is well 
enough to preach about the selfishness of this expenditure; 
but we all spend more selfishly, and we all love pleasure, and 
I should very much like to see that cynic whose pleasures 
cost less than sixpence a-week." 

The Egyptian pipes, especially those of modern date are 




EGYPTIAN PIPES. 



exceedingly fanciful in shape and resemble somewhat the pipes 
used by the Persians. Many of them are made of clay and 
are sold very cheap.* The Chinese use a variety of pipes 
but all of them have small bowls for the tobacco. Some of 
their pipes are made of brass and attached to the pipe is a 
receptacle for water, so as to cool the smoke before it passes 
into the mouth. The Japanese use both copper and silver 
pipes, most of them similar in shape and size to those used 
by the Chinese. 

A writer says of smoking among the Japanese : 

• Watlin says of smoking In Egypt : Tobacco Is tolerated, and spems to becomn more 
tommon again, though a smoker is generally disliked and not allowed to perform the part 
of Imam or rehearse, of the prayers, bi-tore a congrcKation. The grp;iter part of the people, 
bowevi'r, detest and condemn still the use of tohaccii, and I reniemher a Shaumar Bedawry 
who assun-d me that he would not carry that abominable herb ou his Camel, even if a load 
«f gold were given htm." 




SMOKING IN JAPAN. I73 

" Let US sit down to a good Japanese dinner — down on the 
floor. Food on the floor. Fire and cigars or pipes on the 
floor. Sit on your heels, Avaiting. Enter first course — Fish- 
ehin soup. Smoke. Third — Fish, cake and bean-clieese. 
Smoke. Fourth — Eow fish and horse-radish. Smoke. 
Fifth — Broiled fish. Smoke again, Sixth — Custard soup. 

Smoke. Seventh — Chicken stew, 
turnips and onions. Smoke a little. 
Eighth — Cuttle-fish, wafer cakes, 
Kipon tea. Here, if tired you 
can stop at the end of about two 
hours' ankle-ache. All is cleanly, 
well spiced with talk, and served 
with the utmost politeness. Sip- 
ping tea may be substituted for the 
JAPANESE PIPES. lufinitesimal whiffs of polite smok- 

ing. A grand dinner is much more 
elaborate ; at least, so far as the variety of smokes is con- 
cerned. After dinner, rest and smoke." 

An English writer could very appropi-iately call this a 
cloud of smoke as he has another scene herein described. 

" 'Tis all smoke, possibly, but what cannot we discern, 
through a cloud of smoke ? Objects dim, but 

' Thick as autumnal leaves that strew the brooks 
In Vallambrosa.' 

Be the medium of the smoke an honest ' churchwarden,' a 
short clay, or a costly meerschaum ; does the smoke emanate 
from a refined Havana, a neat Manilla, or a dainty cigarette, 
Buch as we are at this moment enjoying as a sequel to a mod- 
est breakfast, 'tis all smoke." 

"We have thus given a somewhat lengthy description of the 
custom and implements used in smoking, from the first dis- 
covery of the plant until now, and turn to other implements 
used in connection with the pipe. We, however, give the 
following from Cop's " Tobacco Plant," descriptive of the 
part played by tobacco on the stage two centuries ago: 

"The 'Return from Parnassus' was published anony- 
mously, and the copy I have used is dateless. It was ' publicly 
acted bj' the students of St. John's College in Cambridge.' 
In Act I., Scene 2d, characters are given of Spenser, Ben 
Jonson, Marlow, Drayton, Marston and Shakespeare, 
together with some other of the known poets and dramatists 



174 THE DEVIL AND TOBACCO. 

of the Elizabethan age. It contains many references to 
tobacco. In 'Act IV., Scene 1st,' the characters are thus 
placed: 'Sir Rodericke and Prodigo at one corner of the 
stage. Recorder and Aniaretto at the other. Two pages 
scouring of Tobacco pipes.' Actual smoking from tobacco- 
pipes was introduced on the stage afterwards ; and instances 
from the early dramas have been given by the writers on 
tobacco history. In the second scene of Act III. smoking is 
alluded to as one of the marks of the current man of fashion, 
and is coupled with that of wearing love-locks, which was to 
prove such a scandal to the Puritans. 'He gins to follow 
fashions. He wore thin sireduelt in a smooky roofe, must 
take tobacco and must weare a locke.' 'Work for Chimney 
Sweepers, or a Warning against Tobacconists, by J. H.,' was 
published in quarto in the year 1603. 

"It was answered in the same year by the anonymous 

* Defence of Tobacco,' a quarto of seventy pages. The 
author of the attack followed the line of King James, or, I 
should rather say, showed him the line to take, for the 
King's ' Counterblast' did not appear until he had been King 
of England for some years. The book is divided into sec- 
tions, each section being called 'A Reason.' The seventh 

* Reason ' against the use of tobacco is, that the devil is the 
discoverer and suggester of smoking. ' It was first used and 
practised,' says J. H., ' by devils, priests, and, therefore, not 
to be used by ns Christians. That the devil was the fii'st 
author hereof. Monardus, in his ' Treatise of Tabaco,' dooth 
sufficiently witnesse, saying: The Indian priests, who, no 
doubt, were instruments of the devil, whom they serve, even 
before they answer to questions propounded to them by their 
princes, drinke of this tobacco-fume, with the vigour and 
strength whereof they fall suddenly to the ground as dead 
men, remaining so according to the quantity of smoke that 
they had taken. And when the hearbe hath done his worke, 
they revive and wake, giving answers according to the vissions 
and illusions which they saw while they were wrapt in that 
order.' It is not unlikely that J. H.'s authority had con- 
fused opium with tobacco. 

" It was the opinion of the age that every Pagan deity had 
a real existence in the Avorld of evil spirits. After further 
quotations of Monardus, to prove that the devil is ' the 
author of Tobacco, and of the knowledge thereof,' J. H. 
concludes his seventh reason by declaring, 'Wlierefore in 
mine opinion this practice is more to be excluded of U3 



TOBACCO ON THE STAGE. 175 

Christians, who follow Veritie and Truth, and detest and 
abhor the devil as a lyar and deceiver of mankind.' In the 
first year of this century, pipes were not only exhibited, but 
were used upon the stage. They seem at first to have been 
smoked, not during ' the induction.' In the induction to 
Ben Jonson's 'Cynthia's Eevels' (1601), the Third Child 
says: 'Kow, sir, suppose I am one of your genteel auditors, 
that am come in, having paid my money at the door, with 
much ado ; and here take my place, and sit down, I have my 
three sorts of tobacco in my pocket, my light by me, and 
thus I begin.' The Third Child thereupon smokes; but it 
seems as if the smoking on the stage was a kind of protest 
against a prior smoking in the pit. In John Webster's 
'Malcontent,' as augmented by John Marston in 1604, Sly 
says in the introduction : ' Come, coose, (coz or goose !) let's 
take some tobacco.' 

" In ' The Puritan, or the Widow of Watling Street,' 
published in 1607, and attributed by some to Shakespeare, 
tobacco-taking or tobacco-drinking (as smoking was then 
usually called) appears no longer in the induction, but in the 
play itself. Idle, the highwayman, says to the old soldier, 
Skirmish, ' Have you any tobacco about you V Idle being 
supplied, smokes a pipe on the stage. These extracts, bow- 
ever, may have been cited before, together with others of 
like character in the great days of the English Drama. 
Pipes continued to appear upon the stage until its abolition 
(in company with the Prayer Book) by the Puritan rulers. 
They reappeared on the stage of the Restoration. In 
Thomas Shadwell's ' Virtuos ' (1676), — to take one instance, — 
Mirando and Clarinda fling away Snarl's cane, hat and peri- 
wig, and break his pipes, because he ' takes nasty tobacco 
before ladies.' " 

There is printed evidence, however, in this same period to 
show not only that all the English ladies of the time were 
not enemies to tobacco, but that some of them were them- 
selves smokers. In 1674 an anonymous quarto appeared 
Tinder the title of " The Women's Petition against Coffee." 
It was a protest against the growing influence of the coffee- 
houses in seducing men aM'ay from their homes to sit together 
making mischief and drinking "this boiled soot." It was 
answered in the same year by " The Men's Answer to the 
Women's Petition." After speaking of the providential 



176 TOBACCO BOXES. 

introduction of coffee into England in the midst of the 
Pnritan epoch, when Englishmen wanted some kind of drink 
which would "at once make them sober and merry," the 
writer glorifies the cofifee-house. 

John Taylor, " the Water Poet," made a kind of compro- 
mise when he attributed the introduction of tobacco, not to 
the devil, but to Pluto, — " Pluto's Proclamation concerning 
his Infernal Pleasure for the Propagation of Tobacco." It 
appears in the folio collection of his works of the year 1628. 
The confusion of tobacco with opium and such destructive 
drugs seems to have been common with the travelers of the 
Sixteenth and Seventeenth centuries. Camerarius, in his 
"Historical Meditations," translated into English by John 
Malle (folio, 1621), speaks of tobacco as to be seen growing in 
many gardens throughout Europe. He quotes Jerome 
Benzo as saying that in Hispaniola " there be among them 
some that take so much of it, as their senses being all over- 
come and made drunke with the same, they fell down flat to 
the ground as if they were dead, and there lie without sense 
or feeling most part of the day or of the night." 

The tobacco-box, during the reign of Elizabeth, was no 
unimportant part of a dandy's outfit ; sometimes a pouch or 
bag was used. Tobacco-boxes came into general use in 
England soon after the introduction of tobacco, and were 
much sought after by all who " drank " tobacco. Marston, 
the Duke of New Castle, and other dramatists, alluded to the 
tobacco-box as a part of the smoker's outfit ; thus in the play 
of "The Man in the Moone" (1609), one character, in 
answer to an inquiry who one of the company is, answers : 
" I know not certainly, but I think he cometh to play you a 
fit of mirth, for I behelde pipes in his pocket ; now he 
draweth forth his tinder-box and his touchwood, and falleth 
to his tacklings ; sure his throate is on fire, the smoke flyeth 
BO fast from his mouth ; blesse his beard with a bason of 
water, lest he burn it; some terrible thing he taketh, it 
maketh him pant and look pale, and hath an odious taste, he 
Bpitteth so after it. 



TOBACCO BOXES. 



177 



The tobacco boxes of the Seventeenth Century were much 
larger than those of the present. Some of them held a 
pound of tobacco besides space for a number of pipes. 

Many of them were made of brass while others were fash- 
ioned from horn : 

" There is also a simple and ingenious tobacco-box used 
frequently in ale-liouses, ' which keeps its own account,' with 
eacli smoker and acts also as a money-box. It is kept on 
parlor tables for the use of all comers ; but none can obtain 
a pipeful], till the money is depositeO through a hole in the 
lid. A penny dropped in, causes a bolt to unfasten, and 
allow the smoker to help himself from a drawer full of 
tobacco. His honor is trusted so far as not to take more than 
his pipe-full, and he is reminded of it by a verse engraved 
on the lid : — 

' The custom is, before you fill, 
* To put a penny in the till.' " 

Some of the tobacco boxes were made of silver and beau- 
tifully engraved with fancy sketches, historical scenes, or 




ENGRAVED BOXES. 



representations of personages, landscapes, flowers, etc. The 
late Duke of Sussex had a large collection of pipes and 
tobacco boxes. 

A journal describing them says of the collection : " The 
Duke of Sussex had a M'onderful collection of these, the 
values attached to some of them being almost fabulous. One 
example from the work-shop of Vienna — long celebrated for 
this description of art, — represented the combat of Hector 
and Achilles, the cover of the pipe being a golden hemlet 
cristatus of the Grecian type." Swiss and Tyrolean artists 



178 



A SONG. 



also produce exqmsite carving, but use wood as a material; 
and in the famous collection of Baron de Watteville will be 
found a marvelous piece of carving representing Bellero- 
phon overturning the Chimera. But French pipes are the 
most interesting of all to collectors, from the fact that tobacco 
was introduced into that country long before it was known 
in England, and also from the ingenuity of a people who can 
give interest of various kinds to what might seem a simple 
and prosaic branch of manufacture. In the sentiment of the 
following lines on " A pipe of Tobacco" by John Usher, all 
lovers of the plant will heartily join: 

"Let the toper regale in his tankard of ale, 

Or with alcohol moisten his thropple, 

Only give me I pray, a good pipe of soft clay, 

Nicely tapered, and thin in the stopple ; 

And I shall puff, puff, let who will say enough, 

No luxury else I'm in lack o'. 

No malice I hoard, 'gainst Queen, Prince, Duke or Lord, 

While I pull at my pipe of Tobacco. 

"When I feel the hot strife of the battle of life, 
And the prospect is aught but enticin', 
Mayhap some real ill like a protested bill, 
Dims the sunshine that tinged the horizon ; 
Only let me puff, puff,— be they ever so rough, 
All the sorrows of life I lose track o', 
The mists disappear, and the vista is clear, 
With a soothing mild pipe of Tobacco. 

" And when joy after pain, like the sun after rain, 
Stills the waters, long turbid and troubled. 
That life's current may flow, with a ruddier glow, 
And the sense of enjoyment be doubled, — 
Oh ! let me puff, puff, till I feel quantum suff, 
Such luxury still I'm in lack o'. 
Be joy ever so sweet, it would be incomplete, 
Without a good pipe of tobacco. 

" Should my recreant muse, — Sometimes apt to refuse 
The guidance of bit and of bridle, 
" Still blankly demur, spite of whip and of spur, 
Unimpassioned, inconstant, or idle ; 
Only let me puff, puff, till the brain cries enough, 



TOBACCO JARS. 179 

Such excitement is all I'm in lack o', 

And the poetic vein soon to fancy gives reign, 

Inspired by a pipe of Tobacco. 

" And when with one accord, round the jovial board, 

In friendship our bosoms are glowing; 

While with toast and with song we the evening prolong, 

And with nectar the goblets arc flowing; 

Still let us puff, puff— be life smooth, be it rough, 

Such enjoyment we're ever in lack o' : 

The more peace and goodwill will abound as we fill 

A jolly good pipe of Tobacco." 

The tobacco jar is another accessory of more recent date 
than tobacco pipes but interesting from the varieties of style 




TOBACCO JARS. 



and shapes. The finest are made of porcelain and are lavish 
in design and enrichment. Of all the articles of the smokers' 
paraphernalia none however exhibit more fanciful designs 
than Tobacco-stoppers used by smokers for crowding the 
tobacco into the pipe while smoking. The author of "A 
Paper of Tobacco " says : 

" This was the only article on which the English smoker 
prided himself. It was made of various materials — wood, 
bone, ivory, mother-of-pearl, and silver : and the forms which 
it assumed were exceedingly diversified. Out of a collection 
of upwards of thirty tobacco-stoppers of different ages, from 
1688 to the present time, the following are the most remark- 
able : a bear''s tooth tipped with silver at the bottom, and 
inscribed with the name of Captain James Rogers of the 



180 TOBACCO STOPPERS. 

Happy Return "whaler, 1688 ; Dr. Henry Sacheverel in full 
canonicals, carved in ivory, 1710 ; a boat, a horse's hind leg, 
Punch, and another character in the same Drama, to wit : his 
Satanic majesty ; a countryman with a flail ; a milkmaid; an 
emblem of Priopus; Hope and Anchor; the Marquis of 
Granby ; a greyhound's head and neck ; a paviour's rammer; 
Lord Nelson ; the Duke of Wellington ; and Bonaparte. 
The tobacco-stopper was carried, in the pocket or attached to 
a ring worn on the finger." 

In Butler's Hudibras it is alluded to in connection with 
the astronomer's sign. 

" Bless us ! quoth he, 



It is a planet now I see ; 
And if I err not, by his proper 
Figure that's like tobacco-stopper, 
It should be Saturn 1 " 

In James Boswell's " Shrubs of Parnassus" (1760) a 
description in verse of the various kinds of tobacco-stoppers 
13 given : 

" O ! let me grasp thy waist, be thou of wood 
Or levigated steel, for well 'tis known 
Thy habit is disease. In iron clad 
Sometimes th)- feature roughen to the sight, 
And oft transparent art thou seen in glass, 
Portending frangibility. The son 
Of laboring mechanism here displays 
Exuberance of skill. The curious knot. 
The motley flourish winding down the sides, 
And freaks of fancy pour upon the view 
Their complicated charms, and as tliey please, 
Astonish. While with glee thy touch I feel, 
Ko harm my fingers dread. No fractured pipe 
I ask, or splinters aid, wherewith to press 
The rising aslies down. Oh ! bless n y hand, 
Chief when tliou com'st witli hollow circle crowned 
■\Vitli sculptured signet, bearing in thy womb 
The treasured Cork-screw. Thus a triple service 
In firm alliance may'st thou boast." 

Tobacco-stoppers ^verc often made of wood from some 
relic liko a celebrated tree or mansion which gave additional 



"WHAT A PIPE! 



181 



Talue by its historic associations. Taylor alludes to several 

made from the well known Glastonbury thorn. He says : — 

" I saw the sayd branch, I did take a dead sprigge from it, 






TOBACCO STOPPERS. 

wherewith I made two or three tobacco-stoppers, which I 
brought to London." 

Pipes and tobacco-stoppers have often been favorite testi- 
monials of friendship and reward. Fairholt says : — 

" It was the custom during the last century to present 
country churchwardens with tobacco-boxes, after the faithful 
discharge of their duties." 

The following lines from " The Tobacco Leaf," penned by 
8ome favored one on receiving a rare pipe, are no doubt as 
neat as the object that called them forth : — 

" I lifted off the lid with anxious care, 
Removed the wrappages, strip after strip. 
And when the hidden contents were laid bare, 
My first remark was : " Mercy, what a pipe ! " 

A pipe of symmetry that matched its size, 
Mounted with metal bright — a sight to see — 
With the rich umber hue that smokers prize, 
Attesting both its age and pedigree. 

A pipe to make the royal Freidrich jealous, 
Or the great Teufelsdrockli with envy gripe I 
A man should hold some rank above his fellows 
To justify his smoking such a pipe ! 



182 MUSINGS OVER A PIPE. 

"What country gave it birth? What blest of cities 
Saw it first kindle at the glowing coal? 
What happy artist murmured " Nunc dimiitis" 
When he had fashioned this transcendent bowl ! 

Has it been hoarded in a monarch's treasures? 
Was it a gift of peace, or price of war? 
Did the great Khalif in his " Houre of Pleasures," 
Wager and lose it to the good Zaafar? 

It may have soothed mild Spenser's melancholy, 
While musing o'er traditions of the past, 
Or graced the lips of brave Sir Walter Raleigh, 
Ere sage Iving Jamie blew his " Counterblast." 

Did it, safe hidden in some secret cavern, 
Escape that monarch's pipoclastic ken? 
Has Shakespeare smoked it at the Mermaid Tavern, 
Quaffing a cup of sack with rare old Ben? 

Ay, Shakespeare might have watched his vast creation 
Loom through its smoke — the spectre-haunted Thane, 
The Sisters at their ghostly invocations. 
The jealous Moor and melancholy Dane. 

Round its orbed haze and through its mazy ringlets, 

Titania may have led her elfln rout, 

Or Ariel fanned it with his gauzy winglets, 

Or Puck danced in the bowl to put it out. 

Vain are all fancies —questions bring no answer; 
The smokers vanish, but the pipe remains ; 
He were indeed a subtle necromancer, 
Could read their records in its cloudy stains. 

Kor this alone : its destiny may doom it 
To outlive e'en its use and history — 
Some ploughman of the future may exhume it 
From soil now deep beneath the eastern sea. 

And, treasured by some antiquarian Stul.'us, 
It may to gaping visitors be shown. 
Labelled : " The symbol of some ancient Cultus, 
Conjecturally Phallic, but unknown." 

Why do I thus recall the ancient quarrel 

'Twixt Man and Time, that marks all earthly things? 



" PUFFS FROM A PIPE." 133 

Why labor to re-word the hackneyed moral, 
Qg (j)v?i,Ao)vyevey, as Homer sings? 

For this : Some links we forge are never broken : 
Some feelings claim exemption from decay ; 
And Love, of which this pipe was but the token, 
Shall last, though pipes and smokers pass away." 

The verse that has been written in praise as well as dis- 
praise of the " Indian Novelty" would of itself fill a volume 
of no " mean pretentions." The following clever lines from 
The Tobacco Plant entitled " Puffs from a Pipe," convey 
much advice to all smokers of tobacco. 

Sage old friend ! with judgment ripe ; 
Come and join me in a pipe. 

Brother student ! brother joker, 
Thee I greet, O ! brother smoker. 

Smoke, O ! man of every station, 
Every climate, every nation. 

East and West, and South and North, 
Recognize Tobacco's worth. 

Red man ! let thy warfare cease : 
Smoke the calumet of peace. 

Chinaman! shun opium-grief : 
Use the pure Tobacco leaf. 

Frenchmen ! no more foes provoke : 
Follow arts of peace — and smoke ! 

German victors ! crowned with laurel, 
Smoke, content ; and seek no quarrel. 

Americans no one needs bid 
To blow a cloud, or take a quid. 

Though rows shake Dame Europa's school, 
Johnny Bull smokes, calm and cool. 

Toffy, it will ease thy brain, man ! 
Smoke and snuff, and smoke again, man ! 



184 A GOOD THING. 

Paddy, light of heart and gay, 
Smoke thy dhudeen : short black clay. 

Sawney, on thy Hielen* hill, 
Tak' thy sneishin' ; tak' thy gill I 

Tourist, thou hast journey'd far; 
Eest, and light a mild cigar. 

Sailor, from the stormy seas, 
Take a quid, and take thine ease. 

" Soldier tired," put off thy shako ; 
Prepare to fire, and burn tobacco. 

Workman, prize thine honest labor; 
Burn thy weed, and love thy neiglibor ! 

Eril-doers, when ye burn 

The weed ; think how soon 'twill be your turn. 

Artist, let thy " coloring" be 
Of a pipe ; thy " drawing," free ! 

Miser, moderate thy greed ! 
Mend thy life, and take a weed. 

Lawyer, loose thy bitter gripe ! 
Burn thy writ — to light a pipe. 

Statesman, harassed night and day, 
Blow a cloud ; puff care away ! 

Hardy tiller of the soil ! 
Light a pipe ; 'twill lighten toil. 

Usurer, we surely know 

Tliou wilt have thy quid j^ro quo. 

Merchant, smoke thy pipe ; liang care ! 
Draughts are always honored there. 

Gentle friend, wliom troubles fret! 
Smoke a soothing cigarette. 

Preacher ! take a pinch witli me : 
Snuff ia dust, and so are we. 



A WARNING. 

Hence with moralizings musty ! 
I say life is " not so dusty." 

Smoke in gladness; smoke in trouble; 
Soothe the last, the former double ! 

Teach the Fiji Indians, then, 

To chew their quids, instead of men. 

Pain from heart and brain to wipe, 
Pass the weed, and fill your pipe ! 



185 




LORD AND LACKKT. 



Prince and peasant, lord and lackey. 
All in some form take their 'Baccy." 

The evil effects occasioned by man's indulging too fre- 
quently in tobacco have been the subject of many a fierce 
debate bet^^een the friends and foes of the "great plant." 
Many, however, are not aware of the fatality attending its 
use by the brute creation. A modern Englisn poet on hear- 
ing of the result produced on a cow from chewing tobacco, 
penned the following sad lines which he entitles — "An elegy 
on somebody's Cow^" 

Weep ! weep, ye chewers ! Lowly bend, and bow; 
Here licth what was once a linppy cow. 
No more her voice she'll raise, now low, now high, 
In amber fields, beneath an autumn sky; 



186 SAD FATE OF A " CHEWER." 

No more she'll wander to the milking-pail, 
While swine stand by to see her chew " pig-tail;" 
No more round her the bees, a busy crew, 
Shall linger, eager after " honey-dew; " 
No more for her shall smoking grains be spread : 
All bellowless remains her empty shed. 

Sad was her fate. Reflect, all ye who read : 
Life's flower destroyed by the accursed weed. 
When first the yellow juice streamed o'er her lip, 
One might have said, " This is a sad cow-slip." 
To chew the peaceful cud by nature bid, 
Degraded man taught her to chew a quid. 
Sad the efiect on body and on mind : 
Her coat grew " shaggy," her milk nicotined; 
Over her head shall naught but clover grow, 
While o'er her peaceful grave the clouds shall blow. 

No invalid shall ask for her cow-heel, 
To heal his ailments with the simple meal; 
Her whiskful tail into no soup shall go ; 
Mother of " weal " that would but bring us woe. 
Her tripe shall honor not the festive meal. 
Where smoking onions all their joys reveal; 
Nor shall those shins that oft lagged on the road, 
Be sold in cheap cook-shops as " a Za mode,'" 
Her tongue must soon be sandwiched under ground, 
Nor at pic-nics with cheap champagne go round ; 
Yea, even her poor bones are past all hope — 
Not fit to be boiled down for scented soap. 

Ah ! hide her hide, poor beast. Her stomachs five 

Dyed with the chewing she could not survive; 

The very worms from her will turn away, 

To seek some anti-chewer for their prey. 

Ye chewers ! be ye pilgrims to her tomb ; 

Lament with us o'er her untimely doom. 

Awhile she stood the anti-chewer's butt, 

Till scythe-arm'd Time gave her an " ugly cut." 

She stagger'd to her death, and feebly cried. 

And sneezed, " Achew! achew! " and chewing died. 

There are many parodies of popular poems ■written in 
praise of the weed ; of which the following in imitation of 
Tennj'^son's " diarize of the Light Brigade," entitled " The 
Charge of the Tobacco Jar Brigade," is one of the best. 



A FAMOUS CHARGE. 



187 



" Epigrams, epigrams, 
Pour'd in, and numbered — 
Good, bad, indifferent — 
More than Six Hundred. 
" Epigrams potters want," 
Quoth The Tobacco Plant : 
Write ! you for fame who pant ; 
Write! we'll three prizes grant." 
Wrote for Tobacco-Jars, 
Over Six Hundred. 

Postmen, ere morning's light ; 
Postmen, whilst day was briglit ; 
Postmen, as closed in night, 
Ran — tan'd and thunder'd 
Loud at our office door ; 
Brought letters, many score — 
Contents of bags — to pour 
Table and desk all o'er : 
Handfuls and armfuls bore. 
Casting them on the floor. 
Then through the town they tore, 
Hastening back for more — 
More than Six Hundred. 

Letters to right of us, 
Letters to left of us, 
Letters in front of us. 
Seeming unnumbered ! 
Envelopes every size 
Met our astonish'd eyes. 
Writer with writer vies ! 
Which wins the chiefest prize 
Out of Six Hundred. 

How did each writer strain 
After a happy vein ! 
Pegasus, spurning rein, 
Shied, jibb'd, and blunder'd. 
Reverend writers, then 
Took up the winged pen ; 
SuflP'rers on beds of pain 
Sought the bright muse again ; 



Lawyer and barrister 
Courted and harassed her; 
M. D.s and editors; 
Debtors and creditors ; 
Artists and artisans. 
Nicotine's partisans ; 
Nurses and gentle dames 
Call'd it endearing names ; 
Poets, ship-masters, too ; 
Ay ! poetasters, too ; 
Wooing fair Nicotine, 
Six hundred scribes were seen. 
Anti-Tobacco cant. 
Bigoted, bilious rant. 
Bursting to vent their spleen, 
Joined the Six Hundred. 

Flash'd many fancies rare ; 
Flash'd like Aurora's glare ; 
Quick jotted down with care ; 
Some the reverse of fair ; 
Some that we well could spare; 
Some that were made to bear 
Blunders unnumbered. 
Plunging in metaphor, 
Not a bit better for — 
Pardon the Cockney rhyme ! — 
Similies plunder'd. 
Praising Tobacco smoke, 
Heeding not grammar's yoke, 
Prosody's rules they broke. 
Many a rhyming moke. 
Sense from rhyme sundered : 
Many wrote well, but not — 
Not the Six Hundred. 
Honour Tobacco ! roU'd, 
Cut, press'd, however sold. 
Alpha and Beta, bold, 
Ye shall be tipp'd with gold. 
Omega shall be sold. 
Others in type behold 
Nearly Six Hundred." 



The following poem entitled "Weedless," after Byron's 
" Darkness," gives a vivid description of the world without 
tobacco. 



188 ^ ^^^ DREAM. 

" I had a dream, and it was all a dream : 
Tobacco was abolish'd, and cigars 
Were flung by " Antis " fearsome space — 
The foreign and the British fared alike — 
And the blue smoke was blown beyond the moon. 
Night came and went and came, and brought no "weed," 
And men forgot their suppers, in the dread 
Of the dire desolation ; and all tongues 
Were tingling with the taste of empty pipes ; 
And they did live all wretched ; old hay bands, 
And street-door mats, and clover brown and dry; 
Carpets, rope-yarn, and such things as men sell, 
Were burnt for 'bacca ; haystacks were consumed, 
And men were gathered round each blazing mass, 
To have another makeshift sniflP. 

Happy were those who smoked, with smould'ring logs, 
The harmless Yarmouth bloater after death — 
Another pipe not all the world contain'd ; 
The furze was set on fire, but, hour by hour, 
The stock diminish'd ; all the prickly points 
Quivered to death, and soon it all was gone. 
The lips of men by the expiring stuff 
Drew in and out, and all the world had fits. 
The cinders fell upon them ; some sprang up, 
And blew their noses loud, and some did stand 
Upon their heads, and sway'd despairing feet; 
And others madly up and down the world 
With " two-pence " hurried, shouting out for " Shag; " 
And wink'd and blink'd at th' unclouded sky. 
The " Anti's " smokeless banner — then again 
riung all their halfpence down into the dust. 
And chewed their tainted pockets ; snuffers wept, 
And, flatt'ning noses on the dreary ground. 
Inhaled the useless dust; the biggest " rough" 
Came mild, tobacco-begging; p'licement came, 
And mix'd themselves among the multitude, 
Run in " forgotten ; uniforms were chew'd. 
And teeth which for a moment had liad rest, 
Did move themselves again; old beaver hats 
Tctch'd little fortunes ; they were torn in bits, 
And smok'd or chew'd at will ; no bits were left. 
All eartli was but one thought, and that was smoke, 
Immediate and glorious ; and a pang 
Of horror came at intervals, and men 
Cried ; and the boys were restless as themselvee. 
Till by degrees their stockings were devour "d ; 



TEIUMPH OF THE ANTI'S. 189 

E'en pipes were dropp'd despairing — all, save one, 
One man was faithful to his pipe, and kept 
Despair and deeper misery at bay. 
By seeking ever for a " topper," dropped 
From some spurned pipe, but that he could not find; 
So, with a piteous and perpetual glare, 
And a quick dissolute word, sucking the pipe, 
Which answer'd never with a whiff, he slept ; 
The crowd dispersed by slow degrees, but two 
Of all the dreary company remain'd, 
And they kept 'bacca shops ; they sat upon 
The scented lid of a tobacco tub. 
Wherein was heap'd a mass of coined bronze — 
Profits of 'bacca sold — they were sold out; 
They, grinning, scraped with their warm, eager hands 
The little halfpence and the bigger pence, 
Counted a little time, and cried " Haw! haw! " 
Like a whole rookery ; then lifted up 
The tub as it grew lighter, and beheld 
Each other's profits ; saw, and smiled, and winked, 
Uncaring that the world was poor indeed. 
So they were rich in pence. The world was mad. 
The populace and peerage both alike 
'Birds — Eyeless, Shagless, and returnless, too— 
Oh ! day of death, oh ! chaos of hard times ! — 
And princes, dukes, and lords, they all stood still. 
Feeling within their pockets^ silent depths ; 
And sailors went a-moaning out to sea, 
And chew'd their cables piecemeal : then they wept, 
And slept on the abyss without a quid. 
All quids were gone, cigars were in their graves; 
The plant, their mother, had been rooted up ; 
Pawnbrokers had a ton of pipes apiece, 
And " Antis " triumph'd. Then they had no need 
To keep a " Sec," so Keynolds got the " sack." 

One of the best of all parodies is one in imitation of Long- 
fellow's " Excelsior," entitled " Tobacco." It is from " Copis* 
Tobacco Plant." 

" The summer blight was falling fast, 
When straight through dirty London passed 
A youth, who bore, througli road and street, 
A packet, thereon written neat ; 

"Tobacoo ! " 



190 THE TRAVELER. 

His brow was glad, his laughing eye 
Flashed like a gooseberry in a pie ; 
And like a penny whistle rung 
The piping notes of that strange tongue — 

"Tobacco!" 

In dusty homes he saw the light 

Of supper fires gleam warm and bright ; 




THE STRANGE YOUTH. 

Above, the ruddy chimneys smoked : 
He from his lips the word evoked — 

"Tobacco!" 

•'Try not the weed," good Reynolds said; 
" I've smoked it 'till I'm nearly dead : 
Take not tlie juice in thy inside ; " 
But loud the jovial voice replied — 

"Tobacco!" 

" Oh ! stay," the maiden said, " and rest; 
I have got on my Sunday best : " 
A wink stood in his bright blue eye, 
And answered lie, without a sigh — 

"Tobacco I" 



** Beware the briar's poison'd root ; 
Beware the birds- eye put into 't." 



THE SMOKER'S CALENDAR. 191 

' This was the Anti's latest greet. 

A voice replied, far up the street — 

" Tobacco I" 

At break of day, on Clapham Rise, 
A pot-boy opened both his eyes, 
And to himself did gently swear. 
To hear a voice call through the air — 

"Tobacco I" 

A traveler up a tree he found, 
Who smoked and spat upon the ground ; 
And then among the blossoms ripe 
He cried, while pufling at his pipe — 

"Tobacco I" 

There in the grayish twilight, " What's 
That you say? " cried eager Pots, 
And from the branch so green and far, 
A voice fell like a broken jar — 

"Tobacco." 

The following lines from the same source have been very 
appropriately called " The Smoker's Calendar." 

When January's cold appears, 
A glowing pipe my spirit cheers ; 
And still it glads the length'ning day, 
'Neath February's milder sway. 
When March's keener winds succeed, 
What charms me like the burning weed? 
When April mounts the solar car, 
I join him, puffing a cigar; 
And May, so beautiful and bright. 
Still finds the pleasing weed a-light. 
To balmy zephyrs it gives zest, 
When June in gayest livery's drest. 
Through July Flora's oflFspring smile, 
But still Nicotia's can beguile ; 
And August, when its fruits are ripe, 
Matures my pleasure in a pipe. 
September finds me in the garden. 
Communing with a long churchwarden. 
Ev'n in the wane of dull October, 
I smoke my pipe and sip my " robur," 
November's soaking show'rs require 
The smoking pipe and blazing fire : 



192 HOLLAND AND FRENCH. 

The darkest day in drear December's — 
That's lighted by their glowing ttnbers. 

The Hon. " Sunset " Cox in his lecture on American 
Humor alluded to the national characteristics of the French, 
Spanish, German, and other nationalities, says : — 

"The highest enjoyment of a Frenchman is to hear the 
last cantatrice, the Spaniard enjoys the most skillful thrust of 
the matador in the bull arena, the Neapolitan the taste of the 
maccaroni, the German his beer and metaphysics, the darkey 
bis banjo, and the American — 

* To the American there's nothing so sweet 
As to sit in his chair and tilt up his feet. 
Enjoy the Cuba, whose flavor just suits, 
And gaze at the world through the toes of his boots.' " 

This would seem to be a feature of the Dutch according to 
a late traveler, who says : — 

" I like Holland — it is the antidote of France. No one is 
ever in a hurry here. Life moves on in a slow, majestic 
stream, a little muddy and stagnant, perhaps, like one of their 
own canals ; but you see no waves, no breakers ; not an eddy, 
nor even a froth bubble, breaks the surface. Even a Dutch 
child, as he steals along to school, smoking his short pipe, has 
a mock air of thought about him." 

The following epigrams for tobacco jars from " The 
Tobacco Plant " evince much " taste, wit, and ingenuity." 

Fill the bowl, you jolly soul. 
And burn all sorrow to a coal. 

Henry Clay. 

That man is frugal and content indeed. 
Who finds food, solace, pleasure in a weed. 

The " Weed, 

Behold ! this vessel hath a moral got. 
Tobacco-smokers all must go to pot. 

Epigrammatic. 

A weed you call me, but j-ou'U own 
No rose was e'er more fully blown. 

Sic Itur ad Nostra, 

Great Jove, Pandora's box with jars did fill 
This Jar alone has power those jars to still. 

In Nuhilus. 



EPIGRAMS. 



193 



Tobacco some say, is a potent narcotic, 

That rules half the world in a way quite despotic ; 

So to punish him well for his wicked and merry tricks, 

We'll burn him forthwith, as they used to do heretics. 

Zed. 




SMOKER READING EPIGRAMS. 

No use to draw upon a bank if no effects are there, 

But a draw of this Tobacco is quite a safe affair ; 

And a pipe with fragrant weed (such as I hold) neatly stuffed. 

Is just the only thing on earth that ought to be well puffed. 

R. s. r. p. 

Poor woman " pipes her eye," 
When in affliction's gripe ; 
But man, far wiser grown. 
Just eyes his pipe. 

In Nubilus. 

Sir Walter Ealeigh ! name of worth, 
How sweet for thee to know 
King James, who never smoked on earth, 
Is smoking down below. 

Bx Fumo dare Lueem, 



Travelers say Tobacco springs 
From the graves of Indian kings : 
Fill your pipe, then — smoke will be 

13 



J94 EPIGRAMS. 

Incense to their memory. 

Though the weed's nor rich nor rare, 

'Tis a balm for every care. 

Peter Piper, 

Give me the weed, the fragrant weed, 

My wearied brain to calm ; 

In a wreath of smoke, while I crack my joke, 

I'll find a healing balm. 

Day after day, let come what may, 
The pipe of peace I'll fill ; 
I readily pay for briar or clay. 
To save a doctor's bill. 

Pompone, 

Great men need no pompous marble 
To perpetuate their name ; 
Household gear and common trinkets 
Best remind us of their fame. 

Raleigh's glory rests immortal 
On ten thousand thousand urns, 
Every jar is in memcriam, 
Every fragrant pipe taat burns. 

At an Ash. 

There are jars of jelly, jars of jam. 

Jars of potted-beef and ham ; 

But welcome most to me, by far, 

Is my dear old Tobacco- Jar. 

There are pipes producing sounds divine, 

Pipes producing luscious wine ; 

But when I consolation need, 

I take the pipe that burns the weed. 

Jars. 

Friend of my youth, companion of my later days. 
What needs my muse to sing thy various praise? 
In country or in town, on land or sea, 
The weed is still delightful company. 
In joy or sorrow, grief or racking pain. 
We fly to thee for solace once again. 
Delicious plant, by all the world consumed, 
'Tis pity thou, like man, to ashes too art doom'd. 

Urutxinu 



EPIGRAMS. 



195 



Hail plant of power, more than king's renown, 
Beloved alike in country and in town ; 
In hotter climes oft mingled with the jet 
Of falling fountains ; whilst the cigarette 
Kisses the fair one's lips, and by thy breath 
Eedeems the wearied heart from ennui's death. 

Theta. 

If e'er in social jars you join, 
Seek this, and let them cease : 
Let all your quarrels end in smoke, 
And pass the pipe of peace. 

Fumigator. 

Many a jar of old outbroke 
Into fire and riot ; 




THE EXPLOSION. 



This will yield, with fragrant smoke, 
Happy thought, and quiet. 

41,911. 



The moralist, philosopher, and sage. 
Have sought by every means, in every age. 
That which should cause the strife of men to cease, 
And steep the world in fellowship and peace ; 



1^ EPIGRAMS. 

But all their toil and diligence were vain, 
'Till Ealeigh, noble Raleigh ! crossed the main, 
And brought to Britain's shores the wish'd-for prize, 
The sovereign balm of life — within it lies. 

Dura Spiro Fumigo. 

To rich men a pastime, to poor men a treat, 
To all a true tonic most bracing and sweet, 
To talent a pleasure, to genius a joy. 
To workmen a comfort, to none an alloy. 
The tyrant it softens ; it soothes him if mad. 
The king who may rule if he smokes not, is sad. 

Kit. 

Sacred substance ! sweet, serene ; 
Soothing sorrow's saddest scene : 
Scent- suffusing, silv'ry smoke, 
Softly smoothing suffering's stroke; — 
Solacing so silently — 
Still so swift, so sure, so sly : 
Smoke sublimated soars supreme, 
Sweetest soul-sustaining stream ! 

Similia Similibus. 

Why should men reek, like chimneys, with foul smoke, 
Their neighbors and themselves to nearly choke? 
Avoid it, ye John Bulls, and eke ye Paddies ! 
Avoid it, sons of Cambria, and Scottish laddies ! 
Let reason convince you that it very sad is, 

And far too bad is. 

And enough to make one mad is 
To be smoked like a red herring or rank Finedon baddies. 

J. S. 

No punishment save hanging's too severe 
For those who'd rob the poor man of his beer; 
But for the wretch who'd take away his pipe, 
I think he's fully execution ripe ! 

Pipe Clay. 

Weeds are but cares ! Well, what of that ! 

There's one weed bears a goodly crop ; 

And this exception, then, 'tis flat, 

Doth give that rule a firmer prop. 

Tobacco brings the genial mood. 

Warm heart, shrewd thought, and while we reap 

From this poor weed such harvest good, 

We'll hold more boasted harvests cheap. 

Festus. 



EPIGRAMS. 197 

To poets give the laurel wreath, let heroes have their lay, 
Of roses twine for lovely youth the garland fresh and gay ; 
But we poor mortals, quite content, life's fevrish way pursue, 
Can we but crown our foolish pates with wreaths of fragrant blue, 
Convinced that all terrestrial things which please us or provoke, 
Of ashes come, to ashes go, and only end in smoke. 

Pocosmipo, 

Whilst cannon's smoke o'erwhelms with deadly cloud 
The soldier's comrades in a common shroud. 
And whilst the conflagration in the street, 
With crushing roar the ruin makes complete, 
Tobacco's smoke like incense seeks the skies — 
Blesses the giver, and in silence dies ! 

Theta. 

Use me well, and you shall see 
An excellent servant I will be ; 
Let me once become your master, 
And you shall rue the great disaster ! 

As coin does to he who borrows, 
I'll soothe your cares and ease your sorrows ; 
Abuse me, and your nerves I'll shatter, 
Your heart I'll break, your cash I'll scatter, 

Use, not Abuse, 

The savage in his wild estate, 
When feuds and discords cease. 
Soothes with the fragrant weed his hate, 
And smokes the pipe of peace. 

Long may the plant good-will create, 
And banish strife afar : 
Our only cloud its incense sweet. 
And this our only jar. 

Scire Facias. 

Breathes there a man with soul so dead. 
Who never to himself hath said ; 
I'll have to smoke, or I'll be dead? 
If so, then let the caitiff dread ! 
My wrath shall fall upon his head. 
'Tis plain he ne'er the Plant hath read ; 
But " goody " trash, perchance, instead. 
Dear Cope, good night ! — Yours, Master Fred. 



198 DOCTOR PARR AS A SMOKER. 

That tobacco in one form or another has been patronized 
from the cottage to the throne, no one will deny who is at all 
acquainted with the history of the plant. And while it has 
had many a royal hater, it can also boast of having many a 
kingly user. A favorite of king and courtier, its use was 
alike common in the palace and the courtyard. It can claim, 
also, many celebrated physicians who have been its patrons, 
and among them the noted Dr. Parr. We give an anecdote 
of him showing his love of weed and wit. 

The partiality this worthy Grecian always manifested for 
smoking is well known. Whenever he dined he was always 
indulged with a pipe. Even His Majesty, when Dr. Parr 
was his guest at Carlton Palace, condescended to give him a 

smoking-room and the company of Colonel C , in 

order that he might suffer no inconvenience. " I don't like 
to be smoked myself, doctor," said the royal wit, " but I am 
anxious that your pipe should not be put out." One day, 

Dr. Parr was to dine at the house of Mr. , who 

informed his lady of the circumstance, and of the doctor's 
passion for the pipe. The lady was much mortified by this 
intimation, and with warmth said, "I tell yon what, 

Mr. , I don't care a fig for Dr. P.'s Greek ; he shan't 

smoke here." " My dear," replied the husband, " he must 
smoke ; he is allowed to do so everywhere." " Excuse me, 

Mr. , he shall not smoke here ; leave it to me, my 

dear, PU manage it." The doctor came ; a splendid dinner 
ensued ; the Grecian was very brilliant. After dinner, the 
doctor called for his pipes. " Pipes !" screamed the lady. 
Pipes! For what purpose ?" "Why, to smoke, madam!" 
" Oh ! my dear doctor, I can't have pipes here. You'll spoil 
my room; my curtains will smell of tobacco for a week." 
" Not smoke !" exclaimed the astonished and offended 
Grecian. " Why, madam, I have smoked in better houses." 
" Perhaps so, sir," replied the lady, with dignity ; and she 
added with firmness, " I shall be most happy, doctor, to show 
you the rights (rites?) of hospitality; but you cannot be 
allowed to smoke." " Then, madam," said Dr. Parr, looking 



200 FIELD MARSHAL BLUCHER. 

at her ample person ; " then, madam, — I must say, 
madam, — " " Sir, sir, are you going to be rude ?" " I 
must say, madam," he continued, "you are the greatest 
tobacco-stopper in all England." Of the clergy, Whatley 
was one of the greatest in intellect, and, as a smoker 
was devotedly attached to tobacco ; his pipes, when out, 
served him for a book-marker. In summer-time he might 
be seen, of an evening, sitting on the chains of Stephen's 
Green, thinking of " that," as the song says, and of much 
more, while he was "smoking tobacco." In winter he 
walked and smoked, vigorously in both cases, on the Donny- 
brook road ; or he would be out with his dogs, climbing up 
the trees to hide amid the branches a key or a knife, which, 
after walking some distance, he would tell the dogs he had 
lost, and bid them look for it and bring it to him. 

Of many warriors, none have been more devoted to the 
plant than Napoleon, Frederick of Prussia and Bliicher the 
Bold. The following anecdote of the latter is one of the 
best of its kind : " As is well-known, Field-Marshal Bliicher, 
in addition to his brave young 'fellows' (as he called his 
horsemen), loved three things above all, namely, wine, 
gambling, and a pipe of Tobacco. With his pipe he would 
not dispense, and he always took two or three puffs, at least, 
before undertaking anything. ' Without Tobacco, I am not 
worth a farthing,' he often said. Though so passionately 
fond of Tobacco, yet old ' Forwards ' was no friend of costly 
smoking apparatus ; and he liked best to smoke long, Dutch 
clay pipes, which, as everybody knows, very readily break. 
Therefore, from among his ' young fellows ' he had chosen 
for himself a Pipe-master, who had charge of a chest well 
packed with clay pipes ; and this chest was the most precious 
jewel in Bliicher's field baggage. If one of the pipes broke, 
it was, for our hero, an event of the greatest importance. 
On its occurrence, the 'wounded' pipe was narrowly 
examined, and if the stem was not broken off too near the 
head, it was sent to join the corps of Invalids, and was called 
* Stummel ' (Stump, or Stumpy). One of these Stumpies the 



SMOKING ON THE BATTLE-FIELD. gQl 

Eield-Marshal usually smoked when he was on horseback, 
and when the troops were marching along or engaged in a 
reconnoissance, and eye-witnesses record that many a Stumpy 
was shot from his mouth by the balls of the enemy — nothing 
but a piece of the stem then remaining between his lips. 
Bliicher's Pipe-master, at the time of the Liberation War, 
was Christian Hennemann, a Mecklenburg and Rostock man, 
like Bliicher himself, and most devotedly attached to the 
Field-Marshal. He knew all the characteristic peculiarities 
of the old hero, even the smallest, and no one could so skill- 
fully adapt himself to them as he. His duties as Pipe- 
master, Hennemann discharged with great fidelity ; yea, even 
with genuine fanatical zeal. The contents of the pipe-chest 
he thoroughly knew, for often he counted the pipes. Before 
every fierce fight. Prince Bliicher usually ordered a long 
pipe to be filled. After smoking for a short time, he gave 
back the lighted pipe to Hennemann, placed himself right in 
the saddle, drew his sabre, and with the vigorous cry, 

* Forward, my lads !' he threw himself into the fierce onset 
on the foe. 

On the ever-memorable morning of the battle of Belle- 
Alliance ("Waterloo), Hennemann had just handed a pipe to 
his master, when a cannon-ball struck the ground near, so 
that earth and sand covered Bliicher and his gray horse. 
The horse made a spring to one side, and the beautiful new 
pipe was broken before the old hero had taken a single pufil 

* Fill another pipe for me,' said Bliicher ; ' keep it lighted, 
and wait for me here a moment, till I drive away the French 
rascals. Forwards, lads !' Thereupon there was a rush for- 
wards ; but the chase lasted not only ' a moment,' but a whole 
hot day. At the Belle-Alliance Inn, which was demolished 
by shot, — the battle having at last been gained, — the vic- 
torious friends, Bliicher and Wellington, met and congratu- 
lated each other on the grand and nobly achieved work, each 
praising the bravery of the other's troops. 'Your fellows 
slash in like the very devil himself!' cried Wellington. 
Bliicher replied, ' Yes ; you see, that is their business. But 



202 OBEYING ORDERS. 

brave as tliey are, I know not whether one of them would 
stand as firmly and calmly in the midst of the shower of 
balls and bullets as your English.' Then Wellington asked 
Bliicher about his previous position on the field of battle, 
which had enabled him to execute an attack so fatal to the 
enemy. 

Blucher, who could strike tremendous blows, but was by no 
means a consummate orator, and could not paint his deeds in 
words, conducted Wellington to the place itself. They found 
it completely deserted ; but on the very spot where Bliicher 
had that morning halted, and from which he had galloped 
away, stood a man with his head bound up, and with his arm 
wrapped in a handkerchief. He smoked a long, dazzling 
white clay pipe. ' Good God !' exclaimed Blucher, ' that is 
my servant, Christian Hennemann. What a strange look 
you have, man ! What are you doing here V ' Have you 
come at last V answered Christian Hennemann, in a grum- 
bling tone; 'here I have stood the whole day, waiting for 
you. One pipe after another have the cursed French shot 
away from my mouth. Once even a blue bean (a bullet) 
made sad work with my head, and my fist has got a deuce of 
a smashing. That is the last whole pipe, and it is a good 
thing that the firing has ceased ; otherwise, the French would 
have knocked this pipe to pieces, and you must have stood 
there with a dry mouth.' He then handed the lighted pipe 
to his master, who took it, and after a few eagerly-enjoyed 
whiffs, said to his faithful servant, ' It is true, I have kept 
you waiting a long time ; but to-day the French fellows 
could not be forced to run all at once.' With astonishment, 
Wellington listened to the conversation. Amazed, he looked 
now at the Field-Marshal, now at the ' Pipe-master,' and now 
at the branches of trees and the balls scattered all round^ 
which made it only too evident what a dangerous post this 
spot must have been during the battle. The wound in Hen- 
nemann's head proved to be somewhat serious ; his hand was 
completely shattered ; and yet, in the midst of the tempest 



204 LITERARY SMOKERS, 

of shot, he had stood there waiting for his beloved master."* 
Tobacco smoking, however, can boast of many patrons 
besides warriors, physicians and statesmen, some of the finest 
writers of the last three centm-ies have indulged in the weed. 
The following extract from the " Australasian " entitled, 
" Tobacco Smoking " refers to many literary smokers. 

" Burke felt himself precluded from ' drawing an indict- 
ment against a whole community,' The critical moralist 
pauses before the formidable array of the entii'e social world, 
civilized and savage. The Cockney, leaving behind him the 
regalias and meerschaums of the Strand, finds the wax-tipped 
olay-pipe in the parlors of Yorkshire : finds dhudeen and 
cutty in the wilds of Galway and on the ragged shores of 
Skye and Mull, The Frenchman he finds enveloped in 
clouds of Yirginia, and the Swede, Dane, and Norwegian, 
of every grade or class, makes the pipe his travelling compan- 
ion and his domestic solace. The Magyar, the Pole and the 
Russian rival the Englishman in gusto, perhaps excel him in 
refinement ; the Dutch boor smokes finer Tobacco than many 
English gentlemen can command, and more of it than many 
of our hardened votaries could endure ; but all must yield, 
or rather, all must accumulate, ere our conceptions can 
approach to the German. America and the British colonies 
round off the picture, adding Cherokees, Redmen and Mon- 
golians ad libitum. The Jew whether in Hounds ditch, Paris 
Hamburgh, or Constantinople, ever inhales the choicest 
growths, and the Mussulman's ' keyf ' is proverbial, India 
and Persia dispute with us the palm of refinement and 
intensity, but the philosopher of Australia is embarrassed 
when he asks himself to whom shall I award that of zealous 
devotion ? 

" Dr. Adam Clarke, who could never reconcile himself to 
the practice, deemed it due to his piety to find a useful pur- 
pose in the creation of tobacco by all-seeing Wisdom, and as 
that discovered by the instincts of all the nations of the 
planet, and practiced by mankind for three centuries, is 
wrong, the benevolent Wesleyan of Heydon, applied himself 
diligently and generously to correct the world, and to vindi- 
cate its Author. " In some rare cases of internal injury 
tobacco may be used but not in the customary way.' Be it 

•During the conquest of Holland, Louvals paid more attention to furnishing tobacco than 
provisions ; and even at this day, as well as In former times, more care is taken to procure 
tobacco than bread to the soldier. Every eoldier was obliged to have his pipe and bis 
matches. 



DOCTOR CLARKE ON TOBACCO. 205 

known, then, that the Creator has not created it in vain. 
Dr. Clarke must have been a very good-natured man. He 
tortured his brains to lind a hope of pardon for Judas Iscariot, 
and held that the creature (Nachash) who tempted Eve was 
not a serpent but a monkey cursed by the forfeiture of 
patella, and podex • therefore doomed to crawl ! But I fear, 
if the present form of using tobacco be not the true one, we 
must despair of ever finding it, and people will go on smok- 
ing and ' hearing reason ' as long as the world goes round. 
Robert Hall received a pamphlet denouncing the pipe. IIo 
read it, and returned it. 'I cannot, sir, confute your argu- 
ments, and I cannot give up smoking,' was his comment. 
It is loosely asserted that smoking is more prevalent among 
scholars, intellectualists, and men who live by their brains, 
than among artisans and subduers of the soil. This is an 
error. Tobacco is less a fosterer of thought than a solace of 
mental vacuity. The thinker smokes in the intervals of 
work, impatient of ennui as well as of lassitude, and the 
ploughman, the digger, the blacksmith or the teamster, lights 
his cutty for the same reason. No true worker, be he digger, 
or divine, blends real work with either smoking or drinking. 
Whenever you see a fellow drink or smoke during work, 
spot him for a gone coon ; he will come to grief, and that 
right soon. Sleep stimulates thought, and sometimes a pipe 
will bring sleep, but trust it not of itself for either thought 
or strength. It combats ennui, lassitude, and intolerable 
vacuity, soothing the nerves and diverting attention from 
self. Sam Johnson came very near the mark : ' I wonder 
why a thing that costs so little trouble, yet has just sufficient 
semblance of doing something to break utter idleness, should 
go out of fashion. To be sure, it is a horrible thing blow- 
ing smoke out ; but every man needs something to quiet 
him — as, beating with his feet.' 

"Life is really too short for moralists and medici who 
have read Don Quixote, to attack a verdict arrived at and 
acted upon by the combined nations of the entire world, 
during the expepience of three centuries, and apparently 
deepened by their advancing civilization. Give us rules and 
modifications, give us guides and correctives, give us warnings 
against excess, precipitancy, and neglect of other enjoyments, 
or of important duties, if you will. The urbane asstheticism 
that regulates pleasure also limits it ; and true refinement ever 
modifies the indulgence it pervades. But it is emulating 
Mrs. Partington and her mop to attempt to preach down a 



206 NOTED SMOKERS. 

world. When they do agree, their unanimity is irresistible. 
Prohibition may give zest to enjoyment, and provocation to 
curiosity, but can never overcome the instincts of nature or 
cravings of nervous irritability, and he who rises in rebellion 
against her absolute decree will respect the limits and study 
the laws of a recognized and regulated enjoyment. 

" Let, then, the moralist point out what social duties may 
be imperilled ; let the physician apprise us of the disorders 
to be guarded against ; and let the lover of elegance see that 
no neglect or slight awaits her. Of abstract arguments we 
have seen the futility, of moral and medical crusades even 
the most patient are weary, and we gladly turn to something 
real in the suffrages of a by-gone great man of acknowledged 
fame — Ben Jonson. Ben Jonson loved the 'durne weed,' 
and describes its every accident with the gusto of a con- 
noisseur. Hobbes smoked, after his early dinner, pipes 
innumerable. Milton never went to bed without a pipe and 
a glass of water, which I cannot help associating with his : 

' Adam waked, 
So custom'd, for his sleep was aery light, of pure digestion bred 
And temperate vapors bland !' 

" Sir Isaac Newton was smoking in his garden at Wools- 
thorpe when the apple fell. Addison had a pipe in his 
mouth at all hours, at ' Buttons.' Fielding both smoked and 
chewed. About 1740 it became unfashionable, and was ban- 
ished from St. James' to the country squires and parsons. 
Squire Western, in Tom. Jones, arriving in town, sends off 
Parson Supple to Basingstoke, where he had left his Tobacco- 
box ! The snuff-box was substituted. Lord Mark Kerr, a 
brave officer who affected the petit maitre {d la Pelham, in 
Lord Lytton's second novel), invented the invisible hinges, 
and it was this ' going out of fashion ' that Jonson alluded to 
in 1T74. 

" We next find Tobacco rearing its head under the auspices 
of Paley and Parr. Paley had one of the most orderly 
minds ever given to man. A vein of shrewd and humorous 
sarcasm, together with an under-current of quiet selfishness, 
made him a very pleasant companion. ' I cannot afford to 
keep a conscience any more than a carriage,' was worthy of 
Erasmus, perhaps of Robelais. ' Our delight was,' said an 
old Jonsonian to the writer, ' to get old Paley, on a cold 
winter's night, to put up his legs, wrap them well up, stir the 
fire, and fill him a long Dutch pipe ; he would talk away, sir, 



o2^ 













"^-'•'^/.J.^^ 

'^*%.%" 



^<^^'^.jm^j/i^. 



NEWTON AND HIS PIPE. 



208 NOTED SMOKERS. 

like a being of a higher sphere. He declined any punch, but 
drank it up as fast as we replenished his glass. He would 
smoke any given quantity of Tobacco, and drink any given 
quantity of punch.' 

" Parr smoked ostentatiously and vainly, as he did every- 
thing. He used only the finest Tobacco, half-filling his pipe 
with salt. He wrote and read, and smoked and wrote, rising 
early, and talking fustian. He was a sort of miniature 
Brummagem Johnson. Except his preface to Bellendenus, 
you might burn all he has written. His '■ Life of Fox ' is 
beneath contempt. His letters are simply laughable, 
especially his characters of contemporaries. He, however, 
was an amiable and good-natured man, and had suflacient 
humanity to regard dissent as an impediment to his recogni- 
tion of intellectual or moral worth. Parr was an arrogant 
old coxcomb, who abused the respectful kindness he received, 
and took his pipe into drawing-rooms. I pass over the Duke 
of Bridgewater, because he was early crossed in love by a 
most beautiful girl, could not bear the sight of a flower even 
growing, and passed life in a pot-house with a pipe, listening 
to Brindley, whose intellect and dialect must have been alike 
incomprehensible to him. 

" The cigar appeared about 1812 ; it received the counte- 
nance of the Regent, who had hitherto confined himself to 
macobau snuff, scented with lavender and the tonquin bean. 
Person smoked many bundles of cheroots, which nabobs 
began to import. After 1815 the continental visits were 
resumed, and the practice of smoking began steadily to 
increase. The German china bowl with globular receiver of 
the essential oil, the absorbent meerschaum, the red Turkish 
bell-shaped clay, the elaborate hookah, — a really elegant 
ornament, and perhaps the most healthful and rational form 
of smoking, — pipes of all shapes, began to fill the shops of 
London. Coleridge, when cured of opium, took to snuff. 
Byron wrote dashingly about ' sublime Tobacco,' but I do not 
think he carried the practice to excess. Shelley never 
smoked, nor Wordsworth, nor Keats. Campbell loved a 
pipe. John Gibson Lockhart was seldom without a cigar. 
Sir Walter Scott smoked in his carriage, and regularly after 
dinner, loving both pipes and cigars. Professor Wilson 
smoked steadily, as did Charles Lamb. Carlyle, now some- 
what past seventy, has been a sturdy smoker for years. 
Goethe did not smoke, neither did Shakespeare. I cannot 
recall a single allusion to Tobacco in all his plays ; even Sir 
Toby Belch does not add the pipe to his burnt sack. But 



NOTED SMOKERS. 



209 



Shakespeare hated every form of debauchery. The peni- 
tence of Cassio is more prominent than was his fun. ' What ! 
drunk ? and talk fustian and speak parrot, and discourse with 
one's shadow V Shakespeare held drunkenness in disgust. 
Even Falstaif is more an intellectual man than a sot. "What 
actor could play Falstaff after riding forty miles and being 
well thrashed ? Yet, when FalstafF sustains the evening at 
the Boar's Head, he has ridden to Gadshill and back, forty- 
four miles ! No palsied sot, he. Hamlet's disgust at his 
countrymen is well known. ' Grim death, how foul and 
loathsome is thine image !' is the comment on the drunken 
Kit Sly. In short, when you look at the smooth, happy, 
half-feminine face of Shakespeare, you see one to whom all 
forms of debauchery were ungenial. A courtier certainly, 
and a lover of money. The king had written against 
Tobacco, and Will Shakespeare set his watch to the time. 
Raleigh and Coliban Jonson might smoke at the Mermaid — 
Will kept his head clear and his doublet sweet. 

"Alfred Tennyson is a persistent smoker of some forty 
years. Dickens, Jerrold and Thackeray all puffed. Lord 

Lytton loves a long pipe 
at night and cigars by day. 
Lord Houghton smokes 
moderately. The late J. 
M. Kemble, author of 
1^5 ' The Seasons in England,' 
was a tremendous smoker. 
Moore cared not for it; 
indeed, I think that Irish 
gentlemen smoke much 
less than English. Well- 
>ington shunned it ; so did 
Peel. D'lsraeli loved the 
long pipe in his youth, 
but in middle age pro- 

TENNYSON, SMOKING. T^'^'f^H^ M ^^T^ ^^"^^ 9^ 

love. While 1 am writ- 
ing, it is not too much to aver that 99 persons out of 100, 
taken at random, under forty years of age, smoke habitually 
every daj' of their lives. How many in Melbourne injure 
health and brain, I leave to more skilled and morose critics. 
But my mind misgives me. Paralysis is becoming very 
frequent. 

" I have seen stone pipes from Gambia, shaped like the 
letter U consisting each of one solid flint, hollowed through, 
14 




210 PLEASANT PIPES. 

also hookahs made by sailors with cocoannt shells. All, 
however, now agree that it is impossible to have either com- 
fortable, cool, or safe smoking, unless through a substance 
like clay, porous and absorbent, especially as portable pipes 
are the mode. Those of black charcoal are not handsome ; 
indeed, I always feel like a mute at a funeral while smoking 
one, but they are delightfully cool, absorbing more essential 
oil of nicotine, and more quickly than any meerschaum. I 
caution the smoker to have an old glove on ; as these pipes 
' sweat,' the oil comes through, and nothing is more pertina- 
cious than oil of tobacco when it sinks into your pores, or 
floats about hair or clothes. My own taste inclines to the 
German receiver, long cherry tube and amber, and to my 
own garden, for all street smoking is unsesthetic, and the 
traveller by coach, boat, or rail has the tastes of others to 
consult. Surely it is not urbane to throw on another the 
burden of saying that he likes not the smell or the inhaling 
of burning tobacco. Better postpone your solace to more 
fitting time and place — the close of day and your own 
veranda. Indoor smoking is detestable. Life has few direr 
disenchanters than the morning smells of obsolete tobacco, 
relics though they be of hesternal beatitude. Give me, in 
robe or jacket, a hookah, or German arrangement, Chinese 
recumbency in matted and moistened veranda, and the odors 
of fresh growing beds of flowers wafted by the southern 
breeze. Nor be wanting the fragrant perfume of coffee. 
' Meat without salt,' says Hafiz, ' is even as tobacco without 
coffee.' The tannin of the coffee corrects the nicotine. And 
it may not be amisa to learn that a plate of watercress, salt, 
and a large glass of cold water should be at hand to the 
smoker by day ; the watercress corrects any excess, and is 
at hand in a garden. Smoke not before breakfast, nor till 
an hour has elapsed after a good meal. Smoke not with or 
before wine, you destroy the wine-palate. If you love tea, 
postpone pipe till after it ; no man can enjoy fine tea who 
has smoked. In short, smoke not till the day is done, with 
all its tasks and duties. 

"I have seen men of pretension and position treat carpets 
most contumeliously, trampling on the pride of Plato with a 
recklessness that would bring a blush to the cheek of Diogenes 
himself. Can they forget the absorbent powers of carpet 
tissues, and the horrors of next morning to non-smokers, 
perhaps to ladies ? Surely this is unsesthetic and illiberal : 
it is in an old man most pitiable, in a young one intolerable, in 



RULES FOR SMOKING. 211 

a scholar inexcusable, from an uncleanness that seems willful. 
Let the young philosopher avoid such j^ractice, and give a 
wide berth to those who follow them. Take the following 
rules, tyro, meopericulo : — 

1. Never smoke when the pores are open : they absorb, 
and you are unfit for decent society. Be it your study ever 
to escape the noses of strangers. First impressions are 
sometimes permanent, and you may lose a useful acquaintance. 

2. Learn to smoke slowly. Cultivate ' calm and intermit- 
tent puffs.' — Walter Scott. 

3. On the first symptom of expectoration lay down the 
pipe, or throw away the cigar ; long-continued expectoration 
is destructive to yourself and revolting to every spectator. 

4. Let an interval elapse between the filling of succeeding 
pipes. 

5. Clean your tube regularly, and your amber mouthpiece 
with a feather dipped in spirits of lavender. Never suffer 
the conduit to remain discolored or stuffed. 

6. A German receiver can be washed out like a teacup, 
and the oil collected is of value, but a meerschaum should 
never be wetted. A small sponge at the end of a wire 
dipped in sweet oil should be used carefully and persistently 
round and round, coaxing out any hard concretions, till the 
inside be smooth in its dark polished grain, of a rich mahogany 
tint. The outside, also, well polished with sweet oil and 
stale milk, then enveloped in chamois leather. The rich 
dark coloring is the pledge of your safety — better there than 
darkening your own brains. 

" The pale gold c'noster and Turkey have now given way 
to the splendid varieties of America, and my knowledge 
halts behind the age. The black sticks resembling lollipops 
are said to be compounds of rum, bullocks' blood and tobacco 
lees. A taste for them, when once contracted, is abiding. 
Fine volatile tobacco, with aromatic delicacy, requires a long 
tube ; used in a short pipe of modern fashion, they parch 
and shrivel the tongue. In short, what is true of all other 
pleasures is also true of tobacco-smoking. Fruition is some- 
times too rapid for enjoyment, as the dram-drinker is less 
"wise than the calm imbiber of the fragrant vintage of the 
Garonne. With Burke's common sense I began, and with 
it I end. Depurate vice of all her offensiveness, and you 
prune her of half her evil. Let not your love of indulgence 
be so inordinate as to purchase short pleasure by impairing 
health, neglecting duty, or, while promoting your own 
self complacency, allow yourself to become permanently 



212 



A TOBACCO WORLD. 



revolting to society, by offending more senses as well as 
more principles than one.' " 

Mantegazza, one of the most brilliant of all writers on 
tobacco, in alluding to the enchantment of the " weed," 
says : — 

" If a winged inhabitant of some remote world felt the 
impulse to traverse space, and, with an astronomical map, to 
fly round our planetary system, he would at once recognize 
the earth by the odor of tobacco which it exhales, forasmuch 




MODERN SMOKERS. 



as all known nations smoke the nicotian herb. And thou- 
sands and thousands of men, if compelled to limit themselves 
to a single nervous aliment, would relinquish wine and 
coffee, opium and brandy, and cling fondly to the precious 
narcotic leaf. Before Columbus, tobacco was not smoked 
except in America ; and now, after a lapse of a few centuries 
in the furthest part of China and in Japan, in the island of 
Oceanica as in Lapland and Siberia, rises from the hut of the 
savage and from the palace of the prince, along with the 
smoice of the fireplace, where man bakes his bread and warms 
his heart, another odorous smoke, which man inhales and 



CRUELTY TO SMOKERS. 213 

breathes forth again to soothe his pain and to vanquish fatigue 
and anxiety. 

" In theearly times of the introduction of tobacco, smokers 
in many countries were condemned to infamous and cruel 
punishments; had their noses and their lips cut off, and with 
blackened faces and mounted on an ass, exposed to the 
coarse jests of the vilest vagabonds and the insults of the 
multitude. But now the hangman smokes, and the criminal 
condemned to death smokes before being hanged. The king 
in his gilt coach smokes ; and the assassin smokes who lies in 
wait to throw down before the feet of the horses the murder- 
ous bomb. The human family spends every year two thou- 
sand six hundred and seventy millions of francs (about a 
hundred millions in English money) on tobacco, which is not 
food, which is not drink, and without which it contrived to 
live for a long succession of ages. 

" In the discomfitures and disasters which befell the Army 
of Lavalle, in the civil wars of the Argentine Republic, the 
poor fugitives had to suffer the most horrible privations, 
which can be imagined. By degrees the tobacco came to an 
end, and the Argentines smoked dry leaves. One man, more 
fortunate than his comrades, continued to use with much 
economy the most precious of all his stores — tobacco. A fel- 
low soldier begged to be allowed to put the economist's pipe 
in his own mouth, and thus to inhale at second-hand the 
adored smoke, paying two dollars for the privilege. What is 
more striking still, when, in 1843, the convicts in the prison 
of Epinal, France, who had for some time been deprived of 
tobacco, rose in revolt, their cry was ' tobacco or death ! ' 
When Col. Seybourg was marching in the interior of Suri- 
nam against negro rebels, and the soldiers had to bear the 
most awful hardships, they smoked paper, they chewed leaves 
and leather, and found the lack of tobacco the greatest of all 
their trials and torments." 

Elsewhere, inquiring what nervous aliments harmonize the 
one with the other, he says : — 

" The only, the true, the legitimate companion of coffee is 
the nicotian plant; and wisely and well the Turkish epicures 
declare that for coffee — the drink of Heaven — tobacco is the 
salt. The smoke of a puro, of a manilla, or of real Turkish 
tobacco, which passes amorously through the voluptuous tip 
of amber, blends magnificently with the austere aroma of 
the coffee, and the inebriated palate is agitated between a 
caress and a rebuke." 



214 QUAINT WHIMS. 

From a Southern paper we extract these whimsical h'nes. 
« On the Great Fall in the Price of Tobacco in 1801," by 
Hugh Montgomery, Lynchbnrgh, Va., 

"Lately a planter chanced to pop 

His head into a barber's shop — 

Begged to be shaved ; it soon was done, 

When Strap (inclined oft-times to fun,) 

Doubling the price he'd asked before, 

Instead of two pence made it four. 

The planter said, ' You sure must grant, 

Your charge is most exhorbitant.' 

' Not so,' quoth Strap, ' I'm right and you are wrong, 

For since tobacco fell, your face is twice as long.'" 

Another quaint whim in the form of an advertisement for 
a lost meerschaum is from an Australian paper : 

" To Honest men and others, — Driving from Hale Town 
to Bridgetown, on Sunday, last, the advertiser lost a cigar 
holder with the face of a pretty girl on it. The intrinsic 
value of the missing article is small, but as the owner has 
been for the last few months converting the young lady from 
a blonde into a brunette, he would be glad to get it back 
again. If it was picked up by a gentleman, on reading this 
notice, he will, of course, send it to the address below. If 
it was picked up by a poor man, who could get a few shil- 
lings by selling it, on his bringing it to the address below, 
he shall be paid the full amount of its intrinsic value. 
If it was picked up by a thief, let him deliver it, and he shall 
be paid a like amount, and thus for once can do an honest 
action, without being a penny the worse for it." 

A humorous writer thus discourses on man, who he 
denominates as "common clays" : " Yet we are all common 
clays ! There are long clays and short clays, coarse clays and 
refined clays, and tbe latter are pretty scarce, that's a fact. 
To follow out the simile, life is the tobacco with which we 
are loaded, and when the vital spark is applied we live ; 
when that tobacco is exhausted we die, the essence of our 
life ascending from the lukewarm clay when the last fibre 
burns out, as a curl of smoke from the ashes in the bowl of 
the pipe, and mingling with the perfumed breeze of heaven, 
or the hot breath of — well, never mind ; we hope not. Then 
the clay is cold, and glows no more from the fire within ; the 
pipe is broken, and ceases to comfort and console. We say, 



MEN LIKE PIPES. 



215 



* A friend has left us,' or ' Poor old Joe ; his pipe is out.' 
We have all a certain supply of life, or, if we would pursue 
the comparison, a share of tobacco. Some young men 
smoke too rapidly, even voraciously, and thus exhaust their 
share before their proper time, — then we say they have 
' lived too fast," or ' pulled at their pipes too hard.' Others, 
on the contrary, make their limited supply go a long way, 
and when they are taking their last puffs of life's perfumed 
plant their energy is unimpaired ; tliey can run a race, walk 
a mile with any one, and show few wrinkles upon their brow, 
" A delicate person is like a pipe with a crack in the bowl, 




THE ARTIST. 



for it takes continued and careful pulling to keep his light 
in ; and to take life is like willfully dashing a lighted pipe 
from the mouth into fragments, and scattering the sparks to 
the four winds of heaven. An artist is a good coloring pipe ; 



216 



UNIVERSAL USE. 



an attractive orator is a pipe that draws well ; a communist is 
a foul pipe ; a well-educated woman whose conversation is 
attractive is a pipe with a nice mouthpiece ; a girl of the 
period is a fancy pipe, the ornament of which is liable to 
chip ; a female orator on woman's rights is invariably a plain 
pipe ; an old toper is a well-seasoned pipe ; an escaped thief 
is a cutty pipe, and the policeman in pursuit is a shilling 
pipe, for is he not a Bob ? " 

From these ingenious " conceits " we turn to a few thoughts 
on the present condition and history of the plant. 

The calumet or pipe of peace, decorated with all the splen- 
dor of savage taste, is smoked by the red man to ratify good 
feeling or confirm some treaty of peace. The energetic 
Yankee bent upon the accomplishment of his ends, puffs 

vigorously at his cigar 
and with scarcely a 
passing notice, strides 
over obstacles that lie 
in his path of whatever 
nature they may be. 
The dancing Spaniard 
with his eternal casta- 
nets whispers but a 
word to his dark-eyed 
senorita as he hands her 
another perfumed 
cigarette. The loung- 
ing Italian hissing 
intrigues under the 
shadow of an ancient 
portico, smokes on as 
he stalks over the 
proud place where the blood of Csesar dyed the stones of 
the Capitol, or where the knife of Virginins flashed in 
the summer sun. The Turk comes forth from the Mosque 
only to smoke. The priest of Nicaragua with solemn mien 
strides up the aisle and lights the altar candles with the fire 
struck from his cigar. The hardy Laplander invites the 
stranger to his hut and offers him his pipe while he inquires, 




THE YANKEE SMOKER. 



DEVELOPMENT OF TOBACCO. 217 

if he comes from the land of tobacco. The indigent Jakut 
exchanges his most valuable furs and skins for a few ounces 
of the " Circassian weed." Its charms are recognized by the 
gondolier of Venice and the Muleteer of Spain. The 
Switzer lights his pipe amid Alpine heights. The tourist 
climbing ^tna or Vesuvius' rugged side, puffs on though 
they perchance have long since ceased to smoke. Tobacco, 
soothed the hardships of Cromwell's soldiers and gave novelty 
to the court life of the daughters of Louis XIV, delighted 
the courtiers of Queen Elizabeth and bidding defiance to the 
ire of her successors, the Stuarts, has never ceased to hold 
sway over court and camp, as well as over the masses of the 
people. 

In nothing cultivated has there been so remarkable a 
development. Originally limited to the natives of America, 
it attracted the attention of Europeans who by cultivation 
increased the size and quality of the plant. But not alone has 
the plant improved in form and quality, the rude implements 
once used by the Indians have given away (even among them- 
selves) to those of improved form and modern style. These 
facts are without a doubt among the most curious that com- 
merce presents. That a plant primarily used only by savages, 
should succeed in spite of the greatest opposition in becom- 
ing one of the greatest luxuries of the civilized world, is a 
fact without parallel. It can almost be said, so universally 
is it used, that its claims are recognized by all. Though 
hated by kings and popes it was highly esteemed by their 
subjects. Their delight in the new found novelty was 
unbounded and doubtless they could sing in praise as Byron 
did in later times of : 

" Sublime tobacco wliich from East to West 
Cheers the tar's labor and the Turkman's rest." 




CHAPTER VIII. 

SNUFF, SNUFF-BOXES AND BNUFF-TAKEKS. 

HE custom of snuff-taking is as old at least as the 
discovery of the tobacco plant. The first account 
we have of it is given by Roman Pane, the friar who 
accompanied Columbus on his second voyage of 
discovery (1494), and who alludes to its use among the Indians 
by means of a cane half a cubit long, Ewbank says : 

" Much has been written on a revolution so unique in its 
origin, unsui-passed in incidents and results, and constituting 
one of the most singular episodes in human history ; but 
next to nothing is recorded of whence the various processes 
of manufacture and uses were derived. Some imagine the 
popular pabulum* for the nose of translantic origin. No such 
thing ! Columbus first beheld smokers in the Antilles. 
Pizarro found chewers in Peru, but it was in the country dis- 
covered by Cabral that the great sternutatory was originally 
found. Brazilian Indians were the Fathers of snuff, and its 
best fabricators. Though counted among the least refined of 
aborigines, their taste in this matter was as pure as that of 
the fashionable world of the East. Their snuff has never 
been surpassed, nor their apparatus for making it." 

Soon after the introduction and cultivation of tobacco in 
Spain and Portugal its use in the form of snuff came in vogue 
and from these notions it spread rapidly over Europe, par- 
ticularly in France and Italy. It is said to have been used 

• Dr. John Hill in his tract " Cantlons against the immoderate use of snuff "gives the 
following definition of it. " The ilried leaves of tobacco, rasped, beaten, or otherwise 
reduced to powder, make what we call snuff." This tract was published in 1761. The author, 
afterwards Sir John Hill, was equally celebrated as a physician and a writer of farces, at 
denoted by the following epigram by Garrlck : 

" For physic and farces his equal there scarce iB ; 
His farces are physic, his physic a farce is." 

218 



ITS INTRODUCTION. 219 

first in France* by the wife of Henry II., Catherine de 
Medici, and that it was first used at court during the latter 
part of the Sixteenth Century. The Queen seemed to give 
it a good standing in society and it soon became the fashion 
to use the powder by placing a little on the back of the hand 
and inhaling it. The use of snuff greatly increased from the 
fact of its supposed medicinal properties and its curative 
powers in all diseases, particularly those afiecting the head, 
hence the wide introduction of snuff-taking in Europe. 
Fairholt says of its early use : 

" Though thus originally recommended for adoption as a 
medicine, it soon became better known as a luxury and the 
gratification of a pinch was generally indulged in Spain, 
Italy and France, during the early part of the Seventeenth 
Century. It was the grandees of the French Court who 
* set the fashion' of snuff, with all its luxurious additions of 
scents and expensive boxes. It became common in the 
Court of Louis le Grand, although that monarch had a decided 
antipathy to tobacco in any form." 

Says an English writer " Between 1660 and 1700, the 
custom of taking snuff, though it was disliked by Louis XIV., 
was almost as prevalent in France as it is at the present time. 
In this instance, the example of the monarch was disregarded ; 
tobac en jpoudre or tobao rapef as snuff was sometimes 
called found favor in the noses of the French people ; and 
all men of fashion prided themselves on carrying a handsome 
snuff-box. Ladies also took snuff; and the belle whose 
grace and propriety of demeanour were themes of general 
admiration, thought it not unbecoming to take a pinch at 
dinner, or to blow her pretty nose in her embroidered moii- 
choir with the sound of a trombone. Louis endeavored to 
discourage the use of snuff and his valets-de-chambre were 
obliged to renounce it when they were appointed to their 
office. One of these gentlemen, the Due d' Harcourt, was 
supposed to have died of apoplexy in consequence of having, 
in order to please the king, totally discontinued the habit 
which he had before indulged to excess." 

Other grandees were less accommodating: thus we are 

• An EngliBb writer gives a different account— "The custom of taking Bnuff as a nasal 
gratificatiOD does not appear to be of earlier date than 1620, though the powdered leaves of 
tobacco were occasionally prescribed as a medicine long before that time. It appears to 
have first become preraleut in Spain, and from thence to have passed into Italy and France. 

t Grated tobacco. 



220 



BOXES AND GRATERS. 



told that Marechal d' Hiixelles used to cover his cravat and 
dress with it. The Royal Physician, Monsieur Fagon, is 
reported to have devoted his best energies to a public oration 
of a very violent kind against snuff, which unfortunately 
failed to convince his auditory, as the excited lecturer in his 
most enthusiastic moments refreshed his nose with a pinch. 

Although disliked by the most polished prince of Europe, 
the use of snuff increased and soon spread outside the limits 
of the court of France and in a short time became a favorite 
mode of using tobacco as it continues to be with many at 
this day.* The snuff-boxes of this period were very elegant 
and were decorated with elaborate paintings or set with gems. 
It was the custom to carry both a snuff-box and a tobacco 
grater, which was often as expensive and elegant as the snuff- 
box itself. Many of them were richly carved and ornamented 

in the most superb manner. Others 
bore the titles and arms of the owner 
and it was considered as part of a 
courtier's outfit to sport a magnificent 
box and grater. The French mode 
of manufacturing snuff was to satu- 
rate the leaves in water, then dry 
them and color according to the 
shade desired. The perfume was 
then added and the snuff was pre- 
pared for use. The kind of tobacco 
used was " Tobac de Yirginie." Spanish snuff was perfumed 
in the same manner with the additional use of orange-flower 
water. Carver gives the mode of manufacturing snuff in 
America (1779). 

" Being possessed of a tobacco wheel, which is a very 
simple machine, they spin the leaves, after they are properly 
cured, into a twist of any size they think fit ; and having 





A TOBACCO GRATER. 



* The Rev. S. Wesley Bpeaking of the abuses of tobacco, Intimates that the human ear, will 
not long, remain exempted from its atSiction. 

" To such a height with some is fashion grown 
They feed they very nostrils with a spoon. 
One, and but one degree is wanting yet. 
To make their senseless luxury complete; 
Some choice regale, useless as suutf and dear. 
To feed the mazy windings of the ear. 



MODE OF PREPARATION. 221 

folded it into rolls of about twenty pounds weiglit each, they 
lay it by for use. In this state it will keep for several years, 
and be continually improving, as it every hour grows milder. 
When they have occasion to use it, they take off such a length 
as they think necessary, which, if designed for smoking, they 
cut into small pieces, for chewing into larger, as choice 
directs ; if they intend to make snuli of it they take a quan- 
tity from the roll, and laying it in a room where a fire is 
kept, in a day or two it will become dry, and being rubbed 
on a grater will produce a genuine snuff. Those in more 
improved regions who like their snuff scented, apply to it 
such odoriferous waters as they can procure, or think most 
pleasing." 

Dutch snuff was only partially ground, and was therefore 
coarse and harsh in its effects when inhaled into the nostrils. 
The Irish, according to Everards, used large quantities of 
Bnuff " to purge their brains." Snuff-taking became general 
in England* at the commencement of the Seventeenth Cen- 
tury, and scented snuffs were used in preference to the plain. 
Frequent mention is made in the plays of this time of its use 
and varieties. In Congreve's " Love for Love," one of the 
characters presents a young lady with a box of snuff, on 
receipt of which she says, " Look you here what Mr. Tattle 
has given me ! Look you here, cousin, here's a snuff-box ; 
nay, there's snuff in't : here, will you have any ? Oh, good I 
how sweet it is !" 

Portuguese snuff seemed to be in favor and was delicately 
perfumed. It was made from the fibres of the leaves, and 
was considered among many to be the finest kind of the 
" pungent dust." Some varieties of snuff were named after 
the scents employed in flavoring them. In France many 
kinds became popular from the fact of their use at court, and 
by the courtiers throughout the kingdom. Pope notes the 
use of the snuff-box by the fops and courtiers of his time in 
this manner : — 



•"The custom of taking Bnuff was probably brought Into England by Bome of the followers 
of Charles II., about the time of the Reiteration. During his reign, and that of his brother, 
it does not appear to have gained much ground; but towards the end of the Seventeenth 
Century it had become ouite the " rage" with beaux, who at that period, as well as In the 
reign of Queen Anne, sometimeB carried ttieir anufi in the hollow ivory bead of their canes." 
—A Paper of Tobacco. 



222 



SNUFFBOXES. 



" Sir Plume of amber snuff-box justly vain, 
And the nice conduct of a clouded cane ; 
With earnest eyes, and round, unthinking face, 
He first the snuff-box open'd, then the case." 

The mode of " tapping the box " before opening was char- 
acteristic of the beaux and fops of this period, and is com- 
mented on in a poem on snufE : — 

" The lawyer so grave, when he opens his case. 
In obscurity finds it is hid. 
Till the bright glass of knowledge illumines his face, 
As he gives the three taps on the lid." 

Spain, Portugal, and France early in the Seventeenth 
Century became noted as the producers of the finest kinds 
of snuif. In Spain and Portugal it was the favorite mode of 
using tobacco, and rare kinds were compounded and sold at 
enormous prices. Its use in France by the fair sex is thus 
commented on by a French writer : — 

"Everything in France depends upon la mode ; and it has 





DEMI-JOUKNEES. 



pleased la mode to patronize this disgusting custom, and 
carry about with them small boxes which they term dem,i- 
journSes" 

The most expensive materials were employed in the manu- 
facture of snuff-boxes, such as agate, mosaics, and all kinds 
of rare wood, while many were of gold, studded with 
diamonds. Some kinds were made of China mounted in 
metal, and were very fanciful. In "Pandora's Box," a 
"Satyr against Snuff," 1719, may be found the following 
description of the snuff-boxes then in vogue : 



\ FAMOUS SNUFFS. 223 

" For females fair, and formal fops to please, 
The mines are robb'd of ore, of shells the seas, 
With all that mother-earth and beast afford 
To man, unworthy now, tho' once their lord : 
Which wrought into a box, with all the show 
Of art the greatest artist can bestow; 
Charming in shape, with polished rays of light, 
A joint so fine it shuns the sharpest sight ; 
Must still be graced with all the radiant gems 
And precious stones that e'er arrived in Thames. 
Within the lid the painter plays his part, 
And with his pencil proves his matchless art ; 
There drawn to life some spark or mistress dwells, 
Like hermits chaste and constant to their cells." 

Some of the more highly perfumed snuffs sold for thirty 
shillings a pound, while the cheaper kinds, such as English 
Kappee and John's Lane, could be bought for two or three 
shillings per pound. There are at least two hundred kinds 
of snuff well known in commerce. The Scotch and Irish 
snuffs are for the most part made from the midribs ; the 
Strasburgh, French, Spanish, and Russian snuffs from the 
soft parts of the leaves. An English writer gives the follow- 
ing account of some of the well-known snuffs and the method 
of manufacturing: — 

" For the famous fancy snuff known as Maroco, the recipe 
is to take forty parts of French or St. Omer tobacco, with 
twenty parts of fermented Virginia stalks in powder; the 
whole to be ground and sifted. To this powder must be 
added two pounds and a half of rose leaves in fine powder ; 
and the whole must be moistened with salt and water and 
thoroughly incorporated. After that it must be 'worked 
up ' with cream and salts of tartar, and packed in lead to 
preserve its delicate aroma. The celebrated 'gros grain 
Paris snuff' is composed of equal parts of Amersfoort and 
James River tobacco, and the scent is imported by a ' sauce,* 
among the ingredients of which are salt, soda, tamarinds, 
red wine, syrup, cognac, and cream of tartar." 

The mode of manufacture of snuff now is far different than 
that employed in the Seventeenth Century. Then the leaves 
were simply dried and made fine by rubbing them together 
in the hands, or ground in some rude mill ; still later the 



224 



A CELEBRATED MANUFACTURER. 



totacco was washed or cleansed in water, dried, and tlien 
ground. Now, however, the tobacco undergoes quite a 
process, and must be kept packed several months before it is 
ground into snuff. One of the most celebrated manufacturers 
of snuff was James Gillespie, of Edinburgh, who compounded 
the famous variety bearing his name. The following account 
of him we take from " The Tobacco Plant :" — 

" In the High Street of Edinburgh, a little east from the 
place where formerly stood the Cross, — 

" ' Dun-Edin's Cross, a pillar'd stone, 
Rose on a turret octagon,' 

was situated the shop of James Gillespie, the celebrated 

snuff manufacturer. The shop is 
still occupied by a tobacconist, 
whose sign is the head of a typical 
negro, and in one of the windows 
is exhibited the effigy of a High- 
lander, who is evidently a compe- 
tent judge of 'sneeshin.' Not 
much is known regarding the 
personal history of James Gilles- 
pie, but it is understood that he 
was born shortly after the Jacobite 
rebellion of 1715, at Roslin, a pic- 
turesque village about six miles 
from Edinburgh. He became a 
tobacconist in Edinburgh, along 
with his brother John, and by the 
*exercise of steady industry and 
frugality, he was enabled to pur- 
chase Spylaw, a small estate in 
the parish of Colinton. about four 
miles from Edinburgh, where he erected a snuff-mill on the 
banks of the Water of Leith, a small stream which flows 
through the finely -wooded grounds of Spylaw. The younger 
brother, John, attended to the shop, while the subject of our 
notice resided at Spylaw, where he superintended the snuff- 
mill. Mr. Gillespie was able to continue his industrious 
habits through a long life, and having made some successful 
speculations in tobacco during the war of American Independ- 
ence, when the ' weed ' advanced considerably in price, he 
was enabled to increase his Spylaw estate from time to time 




JAMES GILLESPIE. 



HABITS AND LIFE. 225 

by making additional purchases of property in the parish. 

"Mr. Gillespie remained through life a bachelor. His 
establishment at Spylawwas of the simplest description. It 
is said that he invariably sat at the same table with his serv- 
ants, indulging in familiar conversation, and entering with 
much spirit into their amusements. Newspapers were not 
so widely circulated at that period as they are now, and on 
the return of any of his domestics from the city, which one 
of them daily visited, he listened with great attention to the 
' news, and enjoyed with much zest the narration of any 
jocular incident that had occurred. Mr. Gillespie had a 
penchant for animals, and their wants were carefully attended 
to. His poultry, equally with his horses, could have testified 
to the judicious attention which he bestowed upon them. A 
story is told of the familiarity between the laird and his 
riding horse, which was well-fed and full of spirit. 

" The animal frequently indulged in a little restive curvet- 
ting with its master, especially when the latter was about to 
get into the saddle. ' Come, come,' he would say, on such 
occasions, addressing the animal in his usual quiet way, 
'hae dune, noo, for ye'U no like if I come across your lugs 
(ears) wi' the stick.' 

" Even in his old age Mr. Gillespie regularly superintended 
the operations in the mill, which was situated in the rear of 
his house. On these occasions he was wrapped in an old 
blanket ingrained with snuif. Though he kept a carriage he 
very seldom used it, until shortly before his death, when 
increasing infirmities caused him occasionally to take a drive. 
It was of this carriage, plain and neat in its design, with 
nothing on its panel but the initials *J. G.' that the witty 
Henry Erskine proposed the couplet — 

' Who would have thought it 
That noses had bought it ?' 

as an appropriate motto. In those days snuff was much more 
extensively used than at present, and Mr. Gillespie was in 
the habit of gratuitously filling the ' mulls' of many of the 
Edinburgh characters of the last century. Colinton appears 
to have been a great snuff-making centre. About thirty 
years ago there were five snuff mills in operation in the 
parish, the produce of which was sold in Edinburgh. Even 
now a considerable quantity of snuff is made in the district, 
chiefly by grinders to the trade. 

Murray, alluding to the popularity of the custom in 
15 



226 



THE SNUFFING PERIOD. 




FOPS TAKING SNUFF. (From on old pTint) . 



Eugland during the reign of the House of Brunswick, says : — 

"The reigns of the four Georges may be entitled the 
snuffing period of English history. The practice became an 
appanage of fashion before 1714, as it has continued after 

1830, to be the comfort 
of priests, literary men, 
highland ers, tailors, fac- 
tory hands, and old peo- 
ple of both sexes. 
George IV. was a na- 
sute judge of snuffs, and 
so enamoured of the 
delectation, that in each 
of his palaces he kept a 
jar chamber, containing 
a choice assortment of 
tobacco powder, pre- 
sided over by a critical 
superintendent. His fa- 
vorite stimulant in the 
morning was violet Strasburgh, the same which had pre- 
viously helped Queen Charlotte to ' kill the day' — after din- 
ner Garrotte — named from his penchant for it. King's 
Garrotte, Martinique, Etrenne, Old Paris, Bureau, Gologne, 
Bordeaux, Havre, Princeza, Kouen, and Rappee, were placed 
on the table, in as many rich and curious boxes." 

Sterne, in his " Sentimental Journey," gives a pleasing 
description of snuff-taldng with the poor monk. He writes: 
" The good old monk was within six paces of us, as the 
idea of him crossed my mind ; and was advancing towards U3 
a little out of the line, as if uncertain whetiier he should 
break in upon us or no. He stoop'd, however, as soon as he 
came up to us with a world of frankness; and luiving a horn 
snuff-box in his hand, he presented it open to me. 

" ' You shall taste mine,' said I, ])ulling out my box (which 
was a small tortoise one), and putting it into his hand. 
" "Tis most excellent,' said the monk, 
"'Then do me the favor,' 1 replied 'to accept of the box 
and all, and when you take a pinch out of it, sometimes 
recollect it was the peace-offering of a man who once used 
you unkindly, but not from liis heart.' 

"The poor monk blushed as red as scarlet, ' Mon Dieu ?' 
said he, pressing his hands together, ' you never used me 
unkindly.' 



THE MONK AND HIS SNUFF-BOX. 



227 



"'I should think,' said tlie lady, 'he is not likely.' 

1 blushed in my turn ; but trom what motive.*, I leave 
to the few who feel to analyze. ' Excuse rae, madam,' replied 
I, ' I treated him most unkindly, and from no provocations.' 

''"Tis impossible,' said the lady. 

"'My God!' cried the monk, with a warmth of assevera- 
tion which seemed not to belong to him, 'the fault was in 
me, and in the indiscretion of my zeal.' 

" The lady opposed it, and 1 joined with her in maintain- 
ing it was impossible, that a spirit so regulated as his could 
give offence to any. I knew not that contention could be 
rendered so sweet and pleasurable a thing to the nerves as I 
then felt it. We remained silent, without any sensation of 
that foolish pain which takes place when, in a circle, yon look 
for ten minutes in one another's faces without saying a word. 

" Whilst this lasted, the monk rubb'd his horn box upon 





HORN SrrtJFP-ITOXES. 



the sleeve of his tunic ; and as soon as it had acquired a 
little air of brightness by the friction, he made a low bow 
and said, 'twas too late to say whether it was the weakness 
or goodness of our tempers which had involved us in ibis 
contest, but be it as it would, lie begg'd we would exchange 
boxes. In saying this, he presented this to me with one, as 
he took mine from me in the other; and having kissed it, 
with a stream of good nature in his eyes, he put it into his 
bosom, and took his leave. I guard this box as I would the 
instrumental parts of my religion, to help my mind on to 
something better : in truth I seldom go abroad without it ; 



"A PINCH OF SNUFF." 

and oft and many a time have I called up by it the conrteons 
spirit of its owner, to regulate my own in the jostlings of 
the world ; they had found full employment for his, as I 
learnt from his story, till about the forty-fifth year of his 
age, when upon some military services ill-requited, and meet- 
ing at the same time with a disappointment in the tenderest 
of passions, he abandoned the sword and the sex together, 
and took sanctuary, not so much in his convent as in himself. 
I feel a damp upon my spirits, as I am going to add, that in 
my last return through Calais, upon inquiring after Father 
Lorenzo, I heard he had been dead near three months, and 
was buried, not in his convent, but according to his desire, 
in a little cemetery belonging to it about two leagues off. I 
had a strong desire to see where they had laid him, when, 
upon pulling out his little horn box, as I sat by his grave, 
and plucking a nettle or two at the head of it, which had no 
business to grow there, they all struck together so forcibly 
upon my afl'ections that I burst into a flood of tears — but I 
am as weak as a woman ; I beg the world not to smile, but 
pity me." 

Many pleasing eflFusions have been written promoted doubt- 
less by a sneeze among which the following on " A pinch of 
Snuff " from " The Sportsman Magazine," exhibits the cus- 
tom and the benefits ascribed to its indulgence. 

" With mind or body sore distrest, 
Or with repeated cares opprest, 
What sets the aching heart at rest*? 
A pinch of snuif ! 

" Or should some sharp and gnawing pain 
Creep round the noddle of the brain, 
What puts all things to rights again ? 
A pinch of snuflf ! 

" When speech and tongue together fail, 
What helps old Jadies in their tale, 
And adds fresh canvass to their sail ? 
A pinch of snuff! 

" Or when some drowsy parson prays. 
And still more drowsy people gaze, 
What opes their eyelids with amaze ? 
A pinch of snuff! 



" PANDORA'S BOX." 229 

" A comfort which they can't forsake, 
What is it some would rather talce, 
Than good roast beef, or rich plum cake ? 
A pinch of snuff! 

" Should two old gossips chance to sit^ 
And sip their slop, and talk of it, 
What gives a sharpness to their wit ? 
A pinch of snuff! 

" What introduces Whig or Tory, 
And reconciles them in their story, 
When each is boasting in his glory? 
A pinch of snuff! 

" What warms without a conflagration 
Excites without intoxication. 
And rouses without irritation? 

A pinch of snuff! 

" When friendship fades, and fortune's spent. 
And hope seems gone the way they went. 
One cheering ray of joy is sent — 
A pinch of snuff! 

" Then let us sing in praise of snuff! 
And call it not such ' horrid stuff,' 
At which some frown, and others puff, 
And seem to flinch. 

" But when a friend presents a box, 
Avoid the scruples and the shocks 
Of him who laughs and he who mocks, 
And take a pinch ! " 

From "Pandora's Box" from which we have already 
quoted, we extract the following in which the use of snuff is 
deprecated by the author : 

— " now, 'tis by every sort 
And sex adored, from Billingsgate to court. 
But ask a dame ' how oysters sell ? ' if nice, 
She begs a pinch before she sets a price. 
Go thence to 'Change, inquire the price of Stocks; 
Before they ope their lips they open first the box. 
Next pay a visit to the Temple, where 
The lawyers live, who gold to Heaven prefer ; 
You'll find them stupify'd to that degree. 



230 PLEASURES OF SMELLING. 

They'll take a pinch before they'll take their fee. 

Then make a step and view the splendid court, 

Where all the gay, the great, the good resort ; 

E'en they, whose pregnant skulls, though large and thick, 

Can scarce secure their native sense and wit, 

Are feeding of their hungry souls with pure 

Ambrosial snuff. * * * * 

But to conclude: the gaudy court resign, 

T' observe, for once, a place much more divine, 

When the same folly's acted by the good. 

And is the sole devotion of the lewd ; 

The church, more sacred once, is what we mean, 

Where now they flock to see and to be seen ; 

The box is used, the book laid by, as dead. 

With snuff, not Scripture, there the soul is fed ; 

For where to heaven the hands by one of those, 

Are lifted, twenty have them at the nose ; 

And while some pray, to be from sudden death 

Deliver'd, others snuff to stop their breath." 

Paolo Mantegazza, one of the most brilliant and witty of 
Italian writers on tobacco, says of its use and " some of the 
delights that may be imagined through the sense of smell :" — 

" Human civilization has not yet learned to found on the 
sense of smell aught but the moderate enjoyment derived 
from snutling, which, confined within the narrow circle of a 
few sensations, renders us incapable of entering into the most 
delicate pleasures of that sense. 

" Snuff procures us the rapture of a tactile irritation, of a 
slight perfume ; but, above all, it furnishes the charm of an 
intermittent occupation which soothes us by interrupting, 
from time to time, our labor. At other times it renders 
idleness less insupportable to us, by breaking it into the 
iniinite intervals which pass from one pinch of snuff to 
another. Sometimes our snuff-box arouses us from torpor 
and drowsiness ; sometimes, it occupies our hands when in 
society we do not know where to put them or what to do 
with them. Finally, snuff and snuffing are things which we 
can love, because they are always with us ; and we can season 
them with a little vanity if we possess a snuff-box of silver or 
of gold, which we open continually before those who humbly 
content themselves with snuff-boxes of bone or of wood. We 
gladly concede the pleasures of snuffing to men of all condi- 
tions, and to ladies who, having passed a certain age, or who, 
being deformed, have no longer any sex ; but we solemnly 



FREDERICK THE GREAT. 231 

and resolutely refuse the snuff-box to j'oung and beautiful 
women, who ought to preserve their delicate and pretty noses 
for the odors of the mignonette and the rose." 

With royalty snuff has been a prime favorite. Charles III. 
of Spain had a great predilection for rappee snuff, but only 
indulged his inclination by stealth, and particularly M'hile 
shooting, when he imagined himself to be unnoticed. Fred- 
erick the Great and Napoleon* both loved and used large 
quantities of the " pungent dust." Of the former the follow- 
ing anecdote is related : — 

" The cynical temper of Frederick the Great is well known. 
Once when his sister, the Duchess of Brunswick, w-as at 
Potsdam, Frederick made to the brave Count Schwerin the 
present of a gold snuff-box. On the lid inside was painted 
the head of an ass. Next day, when dining with the king, 
Schwerin, with some ostentation, put his snuff-box on the 
table. Wishing to turn the joke against Schwerin, the king 
called attention to the snuff-box. The Duchess took it up 
and opened it. Immediately she exclaimed, ' What a striking 
likeness ! In truth, brother, this is one of the best portraits 
I have ever seen of you.' Frederick, embarrassed, thought 
his sister was carrying the jest too far. She passed the box 
to her neighbor, who uttered similar expressions to her own. 
The box made the round of the tal)le, and every one M'as 
fervently eloquent about the marvelous resemblance. The 
king was puzzled what to make of all this. When the box 
at last reached his hands, he saw, to his great 6ur])rise, that 
his portrait was really there. Count Schwerin had simply, 
with exceeding dispatch, employed an artist to remove the 
ass's head, and to paint the king's head instead. Frederick 
could not help laughing at the Count's clever trick, which 
was really the best rebuke of his own bad taste and want of 
proper and respectful feeling." 

"As Frederick William 1., of Prussia, was eminently the 
Smoking King, so his son Frederick the Great was eminently 
the Snuffing King. Perhaps smoking harmonizes best with 
action ; and it might, without much stretch of fancy, be 
shown that as the Prussian monarchy was founded on tobacco 
smoke, it flourished on snuff. Possibly, if Napoleon the 
Great, who like Frederick the Great, was an excessive snuffer, 

•Napoleon, having been unable to undergo the ordeal of a first pipe, Btigmatlzrd it as a 
habit only fit to amuse eluggards. What be renounced in emokiug, however, be cumpcDsaied 
ta snuff. 



232 EMINENT SNUFF.TAKERS. 

had smoked as well as snnffed, he might have preserved his 
empire from overthrow, seeing that smoking steadies and 
snuffing impels. The influences of smoking and snuffing on 
politics and war are ascertainable. What the effect of chew- 
ing is on political and military affairs, it is not so easy to 
discover. We recommend the subject for meditation to the 
profoundest metaphysicians. How many of the American 
politicians and generals have been chewers as well as snuffers 
and smokers ? Is there to be some mysterious affinity between 
chewing and the revolutions, especially the social revolutions 
of the future? May not apocalyptic interpreters be able to 
show that chewing is the symbol of anarchy and annihilation ?" 
When first used in Europe snuff was made ready for use 
by the takers — each person being provided with a box or 




SCOTCH SNUFy-MILLS. 



"mill," as they were termed, to reduce the leaves to powder. 

In connection with this, the following may not be 
irrel event : — 

The following anecdote of Huerta the celebrated Spanish 
guitarist, is taken from one of M. Ella's programmes : — 

" In the year 1826 the famous Huerta, who astonished the 
English by his performances on the guitar, was anxious to 
be introduced to the leader of the Italian Opera Band — a 
warm-hearted and sensitive Neapolitan — Spagnoletti. The 
latter had a great contempt for guitars, concertinas, and other 
fancy instruments not used in the orchestra. He was fond 
of snuff, had a capacious nose, and, when irritated, would 
ejaculate ' Mon Dleu P On my presenting the vain Spaniard 
to Spagnoletti, the latter inquired, ' Vat you play V Huerta 
— ' De guitar-r-r, sare.' Spagnoletti — ' De guitar ! humph 1' 
(takes a pinch of snuff.) Huerta — ' Yeas, sare, de guitar-r-r, 
and ven I play my adagio, de tears shall run down both side 
your pig nose.' ' Veil den,' (raking snuff,) said Spagnoletti, 
* I vill not hear your adagio.^ * 



TOO STRONG. 233 

The anecdote related of Count de Tesse, a celebrated cour- 
tier of France, is one of the best of its kind : — 

" Count de Tesse, Marshal of France, was an eminent man 
during the reign of Louis XIY. Though he was a brave 
soldier and bj no means an incompetent general, 3'et he was 
more remarkable as a skillful diplomatist and a pliant and 
prosperous courtier. During the War of Succession in Spain, 
he besieged Barcelona with a considerable array, in the spring 
of 1705. Terrible was the assault, and terrible was the 
resistance. At the end of six weeks the arrival of the British 
fleet, and reinforcements thrown into the place, forced Mar- 
shal Tesse to retire. Besides immense losses in dead and 
wounded, lie had to abandon two hundred and twenty cannon 
and all his supplies. Incessantly fighting for fifteen days in 
his retreat towards the Pyrenees, he lost three thousand more 
of his men. It ought to be said, in vindication of Tesse, that 
he undertook the siege by express and urgent command of 
the French King, and contrary to his own judgment ; for in 
writing to a friend, he said : ' If a Consistory were held to 
decide the infallibility of the King, as Consistories have been 
held to decide the infallibility of the Pope, I should by my 
vote declare His Majesty infallible. His orders have con- 
founded all human science.' 

" Soon after the siege of Barcelona, a lady at a fashionable 
party took out her snuff-box and offered a pinch to any one 
who wished it. Marshal Tesse approached to take a pinch ; 
but suddenly the lady drew her snuff-box back, saying, ' For 
you, Marshal, the snuff is too strong — it is Barcelona.' " 

In Scotland the dry kinds of snuff are in favor and are 
esteemed as highly as the moister snuffs. Robert Leighton 
gives the following pen picture of the snuff-loving Scotch- 
man ; it is entitled " The Snuffie Auld Man :" — 

" By the cosie fire-side, or the sun-ends o' gavels, 
The snufBe auld bodie is sure to be seen. 
Tap, tappin' his snuff-box, he snifters and sneevils, 
And smachers the snuff frae his mou' to hia een. 
Since tobacco cam' in, and the snuflBn' began, 
There hasna been seen sic a snuffie auld man. 

" His haurina are dozen'd, his een sair bedizzened 
And red round the lids as the gills 0' a fish ; 
His face is a' bladdit, his sark-breest a' smaddit. 
As snuffie a picture as nny could wisb. 



234 SAVINGS FROM THE PULPIT. 

He makes a mere merter o' a' thing he does, 
Wi' snufif frae his fingers an' drops frae his nose. 

" And wow but his nose is a troublesome member — 
Day and nicht, there's nae end to its snuffie desire : 
It's wide as the chimlie, it's red as an ember, 
And has to be fed like a dry-whinnie fire. 
It's a troublesome member, and gi'es him nae peace, 
Even sleepin', or eatin', or sayin' the grace. 

" The kirk is disturbed wi' his hauckin' and sneezin' 
The dominie stoppit when leadin' the psalm ; 
The minister, deav'd out o' logic and reason, 
Pours gall in the lugs that are gapi' for balm. 
The auld folks look surly, the young chaps jocose. 
While the bodie himsel' is bambazed wi' his nose. 

" He scrimps the auld wife baith in garnal and caddy 
He snuffs what wad keep her in comfort and ease; 
Rapee, Lundyfitt, Prince's Mixture, and Toddy, 
She looks upon them as the worst o' her faes. 
And we'll see an end o' her kooshian nar 
"While the auld carle's nose is upheld like a Czar. 

Sharp has written some verses founded upon the following 
singular anecdote in Dean Ramsay's "Reminiscences of 
Scottish Life and Character :" 

"The inveterate snuff-taker, like the dram-drinker, felt 
Beverely the being deprived of his accustomed stimulant, as 
in the following instance: A severe snow-storm in the 
Highlands, which lasted for several weeks, having stopped 
all communication betwixt neighboring hamlets, the snuff- 
boxes were soon reduced to their last pinch. Borrowing and 
begging from all the neighbors within reach were first resorted 
to, but when these failed all were alike reduced to the long- 
ing which unwillingly abstinent snuff-takers alone know. 
The minister of the parish was amongst the unhappy num- 
ber ; the craving was so intense that study was out of the 
question, and he became quite restless. As a last resort, the 
beadle was dispatched through the snow, to a neighboring 
glen, in the hope of getting a supply ; but he came back as 
unsuccessful as he went. ' What's to be done, John ? was 
the minister's pathetic inquiry. John shook his head, as 
much as to say that he could not tell, but immediately there- 
after started up, as if a new idea occurred to him. He came 



THE STORY IN VERSE, 



235 



back in a few minutes, crying, ' Hae ! ' The minister, too 
eager to be scrutinizing, took a long deep pinch, and then 
said, * Whour did jou get it ? ' 'I soupit (swept) the poupit,' 
was John's expressive reply. The minister's accumulated 
superfluous Sabbath snutT now came into good use." 




" Near the Highlands, 
Where the dry lands 
Are divided into islands, 
And distinguish'd from the mainland 
As the Western Hebrides. 

" Stormy weather. 
Those who stay there, 
Oftentimes for weeks together 
Keep asunder from their neighbors, 
Hemm'd about by angry seas. 



"For, storm-batter'd, 
Boats are shattered, 
And their precious cargoes scatter'd 
In the boist'rous Sound of Jura, 
Or thy passage, Colonsay ; 



230 STORMBOUND. 

" While the seamen, 
Like true freemen, 
Battle bravely with the Demon 
Of the storm, who strives to keep them 
From their harbor in the bay. 

" For this reason 
One bad season, 
(If to say so be not treason,) 
In an island town the people 
Were reduced to great distress. 

*' Though on mainland 
They would fain land. 
They were storm-bound in their ain land. 
Where each luxury was little. 
And grew beautifully less. 

" But whose sorrow, 
That sad morrow. 
When no man could beg or borrow 
From a friend's repository, 
Equall'd theirs who craved for snufif. 

"But, most sadden'd, 
Nearly madden'd 

For the lack of that which gladden'd 
His proboscis, was the parson, 
Hight the Rev'rend Neil Macduff. 

" If a snuffer, 
Though no puffer. 

You may guess what pangs he'd suffer 
In his journey through a snow-drift. 
Visiting a neighboring town. 

" From his rushing 
For some sneishing ; 
But his choring and his fishing 
Could procure no Toddy's Mixture, 
Moist Rappee, or Kendal Brown. 

** In his trouble — 
Now made double. 

Since his last hope proved a bubble — 
To his aid came Beadle Johnnie, 
In his parish right-hand man. 



THE SECRET. 237 

*' With a packet, 
Saying, Tak' it, 
It's as clean as I can mak' it, 
If ye'd save yer snuff on Sabbath 
A toom box ye needna scan. 

"Being lusty 
(Though 'twas musty) 
To his nose the snuff so dusty 
Put the minister, too much in want, 
The gift to scrutinize. 

"An idea 
He could see a 
Blessing in this panacea ; 
So he took such hearty pinches as brought 
Tears into his eyes. 

" Then to Johnnie, 
His old cronie, 

Cried — ' I fear'd I'd ne'er get ony.' 
' Well, I'll tell ye,' said the beadle, 
' Whaur I got the stock of snuflF.' 

" ' In the poupit 
Low I stoopit. 

An' the snuff and stour I soupit. 
Then I brocht ye here a handfu*, 
For ye need it sair enough.' " 

The old Scottish snuff-mill, which consisted of a small 
box-like receptacle into which fitted a conical-shaped projec- 
tion with a short, strong handle was a more substantial affair 
than the rasp used by the French and English snuff-takers. 
(See page 232). Both, answered the purpose for which they 
were designed, the leaves of tobacco being " toasted before 
the fire," and then ground in the mill as it was called. The 
more modern snuff-mill is similar in shape, but is used to hold 
the snuff after being ground, rather than for reducing the 
leaves to a powder. 

Boswell gives the following poem on snuff, in his " Shrubs 
of Parnassus : " 

"Oh Snuff! our fashionable end and aim ! 
Strasburg, Rappee, Dutch, Scotch, what'eer thy name, 



238 "COME TO MY NOSE." 

Powder celestial ! quintessence divine ! 

New joys entrance my soul while thou art mine. 

Who takes — who talies thee not ! where'er I range, 

I smell thy sweets from Pall Mall to the 'Change. 

By thee assisted, ladies kill the day, 

And breathe their scandal freely o'er their tea ; 

Nor less they prize thy virtues when in bed, 

One pinch of thee revives the vapor'd head, 

Removes the spleen, removes the qualmish fit^ 

And gives a brisker turn to female wit. 

Warms in the nose, refreshes like the breeze, 

Glows in the herd and tickles in the sneeze. 

Without it. Tinsel, what would be thy lot ! 

What, but to strut neglected and forgot ! 

What boots it for thee to have dipt thy hand 

In odors wafted from Arabian land ? 

Ah ! what avails thy scented solitaire, 

Thy careless swing and pertly tripping air, 

The crimson wash that glows upon thy face. 

Thy modish hat, and coat that flames with lace ! 

In vain thy dress, in vain thy trimmings shine, 

If the Parisian snuflf-box be not thine. 

Come to my nose, then. Snuff, nor come alone, 

Bring taste with thee, for taste is all thy own." 

There seems to be as great a variety of design in snuff- 
boxes as among pipes and tobacco-stoppers. The Indians of 
both North and South America have their mills for grinding 
or pulverizing the leaves. In the East a great variety of 
snuff-boxes may be seen ; they are made of wood and ivory, 
while many of them have a spoon attached to the box, which 
they use in taking the dust from the box to the back of the 
hand, whence it is taken by the forefinger and conveyed to 
the nose. In Europe we find greater variety of design in 
snuff-boxes than in the East. In Europe they are made of 
the most costly materials, and studded with the rarest gems. 

In the East they are made of ivory, wood, bamboo, and 
other materials. Of late years boxes made of wood from 
Abbotsford or some other noted place have been used for 
the manufacture of snuff-boxes. Formerly when snuff-taking 
was in more general use by kings and courtiers than now — 
a magnificent snuff-box was considered by royalty as one of 



SNUFF MANUFACTURE. £39 

the most valuable and pleasing of " memorials." Many of 
these testimonials of friendship and regard were of gold and 
silver, and set with diamonds of the finest water. 

Among the anecdotes of celebrated snuff-takers, the fol- 
lowing from White's " Life of Swedenborg," will be new to 
many : 

" Swedenborg took snuff profusely and carelessly, strewing 
it over his papers and the carpet. His manuscripts bear its 
traces to this day. His carpet set those sneezing who shook 
it. One Sunday he desired to have it taken up and beaten. 
Shearsmith objected, 'Better wait till to-morrow,' 'Dat be 
good ! dat be good !' was his answer." 

We copy the following article on the manufacture of snuff 
from a well-known English journal, "Cope's Tobacco 
Plant:"— 

" Although snuff is still extensively consumed in this coun- 
try (Great Britain), the mode of its manufacture is very little 
known to those who use it ; and there are very few persons 
of even the most inquisitive turn of mind who can say they 
have ever penetrated into the mysterious precincts of a snuff- 
mill. Even those who have been privileged, and have had 
the courage to inspect the interior of such an establishment, 
have come away with very vague notions of what they saw. 
The hollow whirr of the revolving pestles, the hazy atmos- 
phere closely resembling a London fog in November, a phe- 
nomenon which is produced by the innumerable particles of 
tobacco floating about, and causing the gas to flicker and 
sparkle in a mysterious way, and producing a lively irritation 
of the mucous membrane, all combine in placing the visitor 
in a state of amusing bewilderment, and he is compelled to 
make a speedy exit, having only had just a running peep at 
the interesting process of snuft'-making. It is therefore our 
duty to give a description of a process which will be new to 
a large number of people, and will help to clear up some of 
the obscure theories that a great many more entertain of it. 

"Those persons who have travelled on the Continent, and 
who have noticed on tobacconists' counters a small machine, 
somewhat like a coffee-mill, which a man works with one 
hand, while he holds a liard-prcssed plug of tobacco about a 
pound weight against the revolving grater, and produces 
snuff while the snuff-taker waits for it, may imagine that 
snuff in England is produced on a somewhat similar small 



240 



PREPARATION OF THE TOBACCO. 



scale. But this, like many kindred theories, is quite a mis- 
take. In this country there exist large snutf-mills worked by 
Bteam power, and in Scotland there is one water-mill which 
is driven by a water-power of the strength of thirty horses. 
The grinding of snuif is at present carried on much as it was 
one hundred years ago. The apparatus, although effective, 




^^zP^^ 



SNCFF-MILL A CENTURY AGO. 



is very primitive, and would lead one to suppose that mechan- 
ical ingenuity had wholly neglected to trouble itself about 
improving that branch of machinery. 

"All kinds of snuff are made from tobacco leaves, or 
tobacco stalks, either separate or mixed. This in the first 
instance goes through a kind of fermentation, and, like the 
basis of soup at the modern hotels, forms, as it were, the 
stock from which all the varieties in flavor and appearance 
are produced by special treatment and flavoring. Of course 
the strength and pungency of the snuff will depend a good 
deal upon the richness of the tobacco originally put aside for 
it. About one thousand pounds of tobacco would form an 
ordinary batch of snuff. The duty on this would amount to 
about £150, and this has to be paid before the tobacco is 
removed from the bonded warehouse. Having got his heap 
of material ready, the snuff-maker moistens it, then places it 
in a warm room and covers it over with warm cloths — coddles 
it, as it were, to make it comfortable, so that the cold air 
cannot get to it — and the heap is then lef C for three or four 
weeks, as the case may be, to ferment. 

" In France, where, under the Imperial r^^tW(3, snuff-making 
was a Government monopoly, the tobacco was allowed to 
ferment for twelve or eighteen months ; and in the principal 
factory (that at Strasburg) might have been seen scores of 



GRINDING THE LEAVES. 241 

huge bins, as large as porter vats, all piled up with tobacco 
in various stages of fermentation. The tobacco, after being 
fermented, if intended for that light, powdery, brown-looking 
enuif called S. P., is dried a little ; or if for Prince's Mixture, 
Macobau, or any other kind of Rappee, is at once thrown into 
what is called the mull. The mull is a kind of large iron 
mortar weighing about half a ton and lined with wood ; and 
there is a heavy pestle which travels round it, forming, as it 
were, a large pestle and mortar. 

These mulls are placed in rows and shut up in separate 
cupboards, to keep in the dust. The snuff-maker wanders 
from one to the other, and feeds them as they require. 

" When the grinding of the snuff is completed it is then 
ready for flavouring, and in this consists the great art and 
secret of the trade. Receipts for peculiar flavors are handed 
down from father to son as most valuable heir-looms, and 
these receipts are in fact a valuable property in many instances, 
for so delicate is the nose of your snuff-taker that he can 
detect the slightest variation in the preparation of his favor- 
ite snuff. It is related of one old snuff-maker in London, 
who had acquired a handsome fortune and retired from busi- 
ness, that he made it a consideration with his successors that 
he should be allowed, so long as he lived, to attend one day 
in the week at the business and flavor all the snuff. Most 
people will also be familiar with some one of the numerous 
versions of the origin of the once famous Lundy Foote Snuff, 
better known as ' Irish Blackguard.' 

" The excise are veiy rigid in their laws for regulating the 
manufacture of snuff; and with the exception of a little com- 
mon salt, which is added to make the tobacco keep, and 
alkalies for bringing out the flavor, nothing is allowed to be 
used but a few essential oils. And here we must digress for 
a moment to correct a popular error, viz., that snuff 
contains ground glass, put there for titillating purposes. 
What appears to be ground glass is only the little crystals or 
small particles of alkali that have not been dissolved. So 
that fastidious snuff-takers may dismiss this bugbear at once 
and forever. 

" The essential oils referred to form a very expensive item 

in the manufacture of snuff. The ladies would be much 

surprised to see a dusty snuff-maker drain off five pounds' 

worth of pure unadulterated otto-of-roses into a tin can, and 

16 



242 



FLAVORING THE SNTTFP. 




PIRFUMING SNUFF. 



as they (the ladies) would suppose, throw it away on a heap 
of what would appear to them rubbishy dust in one corner 

of the snuff-room. Of 
course the ladies would 
consider the proper place 
for it to be on the cambric 
handkerchief, but this idea 
would be about the last 
to occur to your matter- 
of-fact snuff-maker. 

" In addition to otto-of- 
roses, the scent-room con- 
tains great jars of essence 
of lemon, French gera- 
nium, verbena, oil of pi- 
mento, bergamotte, etc., 
all of which are used in 
the various flavoring com- 
binations. There would 
most likely also be a few 
hundred-weight of fine 
Tonquin beans, and one of these beans is generally presented 
to any visitor who drops in, as souvenir to carry away in 
his waistcoat pocket. Snuff is very extensively used in the 
mills and factories of Lancashire. Those who toil long in 
heated and noisy mills seem to require, and doubtless do 
require, tobacco in some shape or other to keep them from 
flagging ; and as chewing is not polite, and smoking in a 
mill not allowed, the only resource left to the operative is 
his snuff. A singular feature connected with this is, we 
believe, the fact that spinners in very few instances use snuff- 
boxes, they prefer having their supply of snuff screwed up 
in a piece of paper. One retail shop-keeper in a busy spin- 
ning town in Lancashire assured us that he retailed over four 
hundred weight of snuff a week in pennyworths. 

" It is impossible to state the exact quantity of snuff used in 
this country ; but, as far as we can arrive at it from statistics 
at hand, we should say it cannot be less than five hundred tons 
per annum. This seems an enormous quantity, considering 
the comparatively small number of persons who now use 
snuff ; but the great bulk of snuff seems to be consumed by 
particular communities, such as the Lancashire operatives, and 
the consumption of it is therefore not generally observable ; 
and further it should be remembered that those who do take 
snuff, individually use large quantities." 



PROFITS MADE. 243 

Snuff-manufacturing has in some cases been attended with 
considerable affluence. One instance is the London man- 
ufacturer already mentioned, whose profits accumulated to 
the extent of nearly a quarter of a million ; another is the 
Lundy Foote business, and the third a Scotch manufacturer 
(Gillespie), who by the way, practised a bit of benevolence, 
in the shape of building an hospital, in return for the good 
things fortune had sent him. Of course an hospital, like 
many other things, may have a doubtful origin, as witness 
the famous Guy's, which stands as a lasting monument to the 
wonderful profits that used to be made out of the iniquitous 
advance note system. But we do not by any means wish to 
make comparisons which must be odious and although the 
profits of snuff-manufacturing are for a variety of reasons 
^ — amongst others the decreased consumption of the manu- 
factured article — not nearly as large as they were fifty j^ears 
ago ; yet we are sure that the fortunes accumulated by some 
of the old snuff-makers were , the result of honest, upright 
industry. 

Of European tobacco used in the manufacture of snuff 
that of Holland and France (St. Omer) is considered to be 
equal to any grown in Europe. Of the varieties grown 
in America, Virginia leaf is used quite extensively for some 
grades of snuff and " good stout rich snuff leaf " commands 
excellent prices and meets with a ready sale. 

A writer gives the following account of the love the Terra 
Del Fuegians have for tobacco. 

" This morning we were up early, a large party going 
ashore for various scientific purposes, and the others taking 
the ship out in the channel to do a little dredging ; both 
parties were very successful, and added much to our collec- 
tion. As we on the shore were about ready to come off, we 
were visited by a party of Fuegians, five men, four women, 
and nine children, with three dogs. They came in an English- 
built boat, stolen or lost from some English ship. The men 
and dogs landed and came towards us with a great frankness 
of manner. They could talk neither English nor Spanish, 
except the few words, boat, fire, tobac, galleto, arco. But 
they understood the imperial manner of one of our officers, 



244 



LOVE OF TOBACCO. 



who said quietly but firmly, 'keep back those dogs,' and 
immediately drove back the barking curs with sticks and 
Btones. They warmed themselves at our fire, and seemed 
disposed to be very civil and friendly. We gave them our 
remaining biscuit, and what little tobacco there was in our 
party to spare. One of them accepted a pinch of snuff and 
pretended to sneeze, crying ' Hatchee ! ' with mock solemnity. 
An old man sat down on a stone and sang to us a low, 




FUEGIAN SNUPF-TAKERS. 



sweet recitation, or chant, in wild key, or mode, ending on a 
rising melody with each stanza. 

They followed us to the ship, and we gave them some 
calico and beads, and tobacco, and also bought bows and 
arrows, and a sea-urchin, paying them in tobacco. They 
clung to the ship as we got under way, men and women, 
crying, ' Tobacco !' and frantic to catch any fragment of the 
precious weed thrown to them. But at length they let go, 
and we left the bay with the cry of tobacco ringing in our 
ears." 

Having spoken of most of the modes of using snuff in 
both the Old and New World, we come now to a description 
of using snuff at the South, known as " dipping," and by 
Bome as " rubbing," both terms used to denote the same man- 
ner of use. The description of it as given by A. L. Adams 
is as follows : — 

" In the South, and more especially in Yirginia, where 
tobacco has been cultivated for more than two hundred and 



CHEWING AND DIPPING. 245 

fifty years, and where a few pounds of it was the legitimate 
price for a wife, it is not snrj^rising that it should be more 
highly prized and come into more genera] use than in any 
other section of our country. On the banks of the James 
River it was first successfully cultivated by the English col- 
ony, and this simple fact alone must forever throw a charm 
around it, which will foster the pride of the Virginian who 
has any respect for his ancestry, and hold him under sacred 
obligations to use, cherish, and defend the plant and its use — 
all of which he regards as no less a pleasure than a duty. 
Here too its many virtues were first discovered, and its sooth- 
ing efiects first felt and appreciated. 

" To the old Virginian it is indeed a cherished weed, charm- 
ing all manner of diseases, comforting in sorrow, soothing 
the ills of life, and preserving to a good old age and in a 
happy frame of mind all who use it. He believes in its 
superior virtues, and ascribes to it more good qualities than 
to any other known plant. He always carries it about with 
him, and if perchance he gets out he is truly miserable. He 
not only loves but worships it as a cure all. His wife and 
daughters know its virtues full well, and use it with equal 
grace and relish, believing it gives a lustre to the eye and a 
freshness to the cheek rarely surpassed. Among the variety 
of ways in which it is used none attracted my attention so 
much as the novel manner of snufi-taking in various parts of 
Virginia, West Virginia, the Carolinas and Georgia. 

" In sonae localities the practice is unknown, while in many 
others it is very common. I first discovered young ladies 
putting snufi" into their mouths as if eating it, when my 
curiosity was excited to an alarming extent, but on being 
invited to ' dip ' with them I soon learned that they were not 
eating, but ' rubbing and chewing' it, as they called it, and 
in such a lively manner as to soon convince me that they 
appreciated it. I found the habit to be quite common even 
among the young of both sexes — all indulging in it as if it 
afibrded real satisfaction to the appetite for tobacco in some 
form. 

" The young ladies however seemed the more attached to 
the ' rubbing process,' as it has been appropriately styled, and 
defended it with equal logic and grace whenever it was 
assailed. The young gentlemen when in the society of the 
young ladies generally join them in this unique use of snuff, 
as they are always sure to be invited and urged if they 
decline, and to merit their favor of course they must appear 



246 UNIVERSAL USE. 

social. I believe, in credit to their taste, however, that they 
really prefer a good cigar, and think it more in keeping with 
their ideas of manhood and neatness. I have seen young 
girls of ten ' rubbiDg and chewing,' as if they appreciated it 
as much as mother Eve did the apple in the garden of 
paradise. 

" I have also seen old ladies with trembling limbs and few 
teeth ' rubbing and chewing,' as if it made them feel young 
again. I have frequently been ushered unexpectedly into 
the presence of young ladies, and found them puffing their 
cigarettes in a manner that convinced me that they knew how 
to smoke. There is nothing that will more surely and 
quickly bring a stranger into the fellowship and good graces 
of the ladies than to join them in their pet habit of snufE- 
rubbing. It seems to form a bond of friendship which they 
regard as sacred as the vows of wedlock. 

" The older matrons ' rub ' less and smoke more, which is 
in accordance with nature and philosophy : The older we 
grow the more we smoke. They find solid pleasure in sitting 
by the open grate after tea with fifteen inches of pipe's tail 
between their teeth, and slowly but gracefully puffing the 
perfumes of the exhilarating weed into the room, and watch- 
ing with childish pleasure the hazy curling wreaths of smoke 
as they gently float around, changing in form and color until 
they finally disappear up the chimney, affording rich themes 
for meditation and profitable study, and perhaps suggestive 
of earlier days when grandmother, an innocent, blooming 
maid, was exchanged for the weed, the seed of which pro- 
duced the plant she is now burning. Everywhere I marked 
only pleasant and soothing effects from the use of tobacco. 

" The planter is never more indifferent to the ills of life 
and in sympathy with good feeling and pleasure, than when 
he sits down after dinner in his vine-thatched portico and 
lights his pipe, passing to his guests pipes, cigars, and tobacco 
in various forms, leaving them to choose their favorite mode 
of using it. Sambo is never more contented than when he 
burns the weed in a cob pipe, and draws the delicious smoke 
through an elder sprig or muUen stem. But the maid is 
happiest of all when with her lover she sits face to face, and 
they ' dip ' together from the same magic plant — tobacco. 

" In every walk of life throughout the sunny South tobacco 
in some form may be found, and its effects are always the 
same, whether drawn from the pocket of the beggar or taken 
with gloved fingers from the golden tobacco-box of the 



ADVANTAGES OF DIPPING. 



24T 



planter. For snuff the ladies have very nice round boxes 
with lids which, they always carry with them full of black 
snuff highly but pleasantly flavored. They also carry little 
brushes or sticks about three inches long with pliable ends ; 
these they wet in the mouth, then dip into the snuff-box, and 
then place it in the mouth outside of the gums and rub earn- 
estly for two or three minutes. ' Will you dip with me V 




SNUPP-DIPPING. 



is the usual way of putting the invitation, when the box is 
drawn from the pocket and rapped slightly on the cover, 
fiometimes by all present, who thus signify their readiness to 
' dip,' then it is repassed open to all, and the ' dipping and 
rubbing' begins in earnest. 

" The only advantage I ever discovered in this unnatural 
way of snuffing is in avoiding all unpleasant sneezing which 
snuffing is sure to produce, although it is claimed that it 
whitens and preserves the teeth and sweetens the mouth, and 
produces a beneficial effect on the lungs, all of which is true 
or not, just as you choose to believe. ' Will you dip and 
rub with me V said one of the prettiest belles of Winchester, 
and in another city in another state the daughter of an 
ex-governor, handing me a silver-tipped brush and opening 
a rose-wood snuff-box richly inlaid with gold, politely asked 
me to *dip' with her, expressing the belief that friendship 
would always follow. I have frequently been asked by ladies 



248 



SNUFF-TAKERS. 



when travelling tlirougli the country and stopping at farm- 
houses, if I used tobacco — as a hint to offer them some, and 
it was a pleasure to comply, and receive the thankful smile 
of an appreciative heart." 

In other parts of the country the habit of snuff-taking is 
confined principally to old ladies, who use any kind, either 
black or yellow, and who prefer themselves the cheaper kinds. 




But few varieties are used, and there seems to be but little 
taste manifested in the selection of the " dust." Foreign 
varieties are used only to a limited extent, being chiefly con- 
fined to those of transatlantic birth and tastes. The custom 
of chewing and smoking seems to be more popular with 
the male sex than snuff-taking, and one rarely finds a man 
addicted to the latter habit, unless it be one somewhat 
advanced in years. 

Stewart in his admirable paper on snuff gives much 
useful information in regard to the universal custom of 
using it as well as its origin and distinguished uses of the 
great sternutatory. 



THE FIRST SNUFFERS. 249 

" The luckless fate of inventors and originators has become 
proverbial, but the ingenious individual whose nostrils 
rejoiced in the first pinch of snuff stood in no need of the 
niggardly praise of contemporaries or the lavish gratitude 
of posterity. That first ' pinch' was its own priceless reward, 
far above present appreciation or future fame. What mat- 
ters it, that his great name has not been reverently handed 
down to us : that posterity seeks in vain his honored tomb, on 
which to hang her grateful votive wreath ; that zealous anti- 
quaries have raised up innumerable pretenders to his unclaimed 
honors, and striven to rob him of his fame ? Enough for 
that lucky inventor, wherever he may rest, that he enjoyed 
in his lifetime the reward for which ordinary benefactors of 
their kind are fain to look to the future. 

" It is perfectly vain to attempt now to penetrate into the 
mystery which envelopes the name and nation of the first 
snuff-taker: long befoi-e rough, noble-hearted Drake cured 
bis dyspepsia by the use of tobacco, or Raleigh transplanted 
some roots of that precious weed into English soil, there 
were European noses which had rejoiced at its pulverized 
leaves. Conjecture, lost in the mazy distance, gladly lays 
hold of something substantial in the shape of snufi's first 
royal patron. This was Catherine de Medicis, who, receiv- 
ing some seeds of the tobacco plant from a Dutch colony, 
cherished them, and elevated the dried and pounded leaves 
into a royal medicine, with the proud title of ' Herbe a la 
Reine.' For in the beginning men took snuff, not as an 
everyday luxury, but as a medicament. Like tea — which a 
hundred years later was advertised as a cure for every ill — 
the new sneezing powder was hailed a universal specific; 
and so pleasant in its operation, that mankind, acting upon 
the wholesome aphorism that prevention is much better than 
cure, and eagerly anticipated the disease it was supposed to 
remedy." 

" The use of ' the pungent grains of titillating dust ' 
received a somewhat heavy and discouraging blow from an 
unexpected quarter. That ubiquitous power which hurled 
anathemas alike at the heresies of Luther and the length of 
clerical wigs, discountenanced its use, and at length fairly 
lost its temper in the contest with snuff. Whether from 
a prescience of the beneficial influence it was destined to 
exert upon mankind, or from a suspicion of its power of 
sharpening intellects, it is difficult to say ; but Popes Urban 
VIII., and Innocent waged quite a miniature crusade against 



250 PERSECUTION. 

snuff, anathematizing those who should use it in any 
church, and positively threatening with excommunication all 
impious persons who should provoke a profane sneeze within 
the, sacred precincts of St. Peter's pile ; Louis XIV., that 
good son of the Church, filially complied with the paternal 
injunction, but his courtiers were less yielding ; and the 
aiite-chamber of Versailles frequently resounded with the 
effects of the pleasant stiumlant. 

"All persecution has a distinct tendency to establish the 
object of its hate, and so it was with the subject of our arti- 
cle — it only required to be loved ; and I do not doubt that, 
had circumstances required them, snuff would have found 
its martyrs. Its use was not general in England until Charles 
II. introduced it, upon his return from exile, with other 
important fashions. It had been known and used before, as 
had the periwig, but it was not until his reign that it became 
common. When the Stuarts relieved the country of their 
presence for the second and last time, it had become firmly 
established ; and, by the days of good Queen Anne, was such 
a necessary of life, that there were in the metropolis alone 
no less than seven thousand shops where the snuff-boxes of 
the Londoners could be replenished. 

"At that time, indeed, gallants were as proud of their 
jewelled boxes of amber, porcelain, ebony and agate as they 
were of their flowing wigs and clouded canes, the handles of 
which were not unf requently constructed to hold the cherished 
dust. We are told by courtly Dick Steel, that a handsome 
snuff-box was as much an essential of ' the fine gentleman ' 
as his gilt chariot, diamond ring, and brocade sword-knot. 
We know them to have been manufactured of the costliest 
material, heavy with gold and brilliant with jewels, as they 
needed to be when their masters carried wigs ' high on the 
shoulder in a basket borne,' worth forty or fifty guineas, and 
wore enough Flanders lace upon their persons to have stocked 
a milliner's stall in New England. 

" Unfortunately, but very naturally, this extravagance 
rendered snuff a butt for the wits (who all took it, by the 
way), to shoot at. Steele, whose weakness for dress and 
show were proverbial, levelled many of his blunt shafts at its 
use ; and Pope, who himself tells us ' of his wig all pow- 
der and all snuff his band,' let fly one of his keener arrows 
at the beaux, whose wit lay in their snuff-boxes and tweezer 
cases. As the men laid by, in the Georgian era, much of the 
magnificence of their attire, so their snuff-boxes became 



WORKS OF ART. 



251 





FANCY SNUFF-BOXES. 



plainer and decidedly uglier. Rushing into an opposite 
extreme, the most outrageous receptacles for the precious 
dust were devised. Boxes in the 
shape of bibles, boots, shoes, toads, 
and coffins outraged public taste. 
The strangest materials were used 
in their construction ; the public 
taste leaning towards relics possess- 
ing historical interest. Thus the 
mulberry tree planted by Shake- 
speare, the hull of the Royal 
George, in which ' brave Kempen- 
felt went down, with twice four 
hundred men,' and the deck of the 
Victory, on which Nelson died ' for 
England, home, and beauty,' have 
alone been supposed to supply 
material for snuff-boxes to an ex- 
tent which, if known, must con- , 
siderably weaken the faith of their 
possessors in their genuineness. 

" Nor has snuff itself been less 
liable to the rule of fashion than the boxes that held it. We 
will give a few familiar instances. In the naval engagement 
of Yiga, in 1703, when a large Spanish fleet was taken or 
destroyed, a great quantity of musty snuff was made prize 
of, and patriotism ran high enough to cause the ' town' for 
some length of time to resist all that was not manufactured 
to imitate the flavor from which it took its well-known name 
of ' musty.' Nearer to our own time, a large tobacco ware- 
house having been destroyed by fire, in Dublin, a poor man 
purchased some of the scorched or damaged stock, and man- 
ufacturing it into coarse snuff, sold it to the poorer class of 
snuff-takers. Forthwith capricious fashion adopted it, endow- 
ing it with fabulous qualities, and Lundy Foot's Irish Black- 
guard (so it was termed) filled the most fashionable boxes. 

" Again, during the Peninsular campaigns, in which the 
light division of the British army bore so memorable a part, 
the mixture used by and called after its gallant leader. Gen- 
eral Sir. Amos Norcott, had a more extensive sale than any 
other. When Napoleon was at Elba, and folks began to tire 
of legitimacy, as they soon did, it became fashionable to use 
snuff scented with the spirit of violet, and significantly to 
allude to the perfume. Garrick, when he was manager of 



252 FAMOUS SNUFF-TAKERS. 

Drury Lane Theatre, brought a mixture into fashion by using 
or alluding to it in one of his most famous parts. The tobac- 
conist whom he thus favored was his under-treasurer, Hard- 
ham, whom no writer about snuff should omit to notice. He 
was a great favorite with Garrick, whom in his turn he almost 
revered. One of Hardham's most important duties was to 
number the house from a hole in the curtain above the stage ; 
and it is amusing to fancy the little tobacconist, snuff-box in 
hand, calmly watching the pit fill, or from his elevated posi- 
tion admiring the histrionic talents of his gifted patron. His 
shop in Fleet street is also memorable. It was the general 
resort of theatrical men and tyros, who sought to reach the 
manager through his subordinates, and his little back parlor 
witnessed the debut of many who afterwards gained applause 
from larger, though not more exacting audiences. 

" Her Majesty Queen Charlotte has bequeathed her name 
to a once favorite mixture, and George the Fourth has some 
slight chance of being remembered by the famous ' Prince's 
Mixture,' which was so popular when it was the fashion to 
admire and imitate that gifted individual. It would be a 
grateful but almost an impossible task to enumerate the 
kings, soldiers, lawyers, poets and actors who had sought 
from and found in the snuff-box comfort and inspiration. 
Prominent among the rulers of the earth who have acknowl- 
edged the pleasing influence of snuff is Frederick the Great. 
His snuff-box was the pocket of the long waistcoats of that 
period, in which he kept large quantities loose — a dirty habit, 
which Napoleon, who was a great plagiarist, adopted. It 
would be easy to draw out a famous list of literary names 
attached to snuff, beginning with Dryden, who was particular 
enough to manufacture his own mixture, and selfish enough 
to preserve the secret of its excellence, with a view, prob- 
ably, of enhancing the value of the pinch from his box, for 
which the beaux and wits at Will's intrigued. 

" In the pulpit, at the bar, and on the stage, snuff has been 
equally valuable in adding to the persuasive eloquence and 
talent of its patrons. By the female portion of human-kind 
it was at one time pretty generally taken, nor was it uncom- 
mon for young and even pretty women to offer and accept a 
pinch in public. After the gentle sex had to a great extent 
given up the habit, some strong minded females were to be 
found who retained it. Mrs. Siddons, when she came off the 
stage after dying hard, as Desdemona, or harrowing the hearts 
of her audience by her representation of Jane Shore, could 



SNUFF AS A PACIFICATOR. 253 

composedly ask those around for a pinch of the precious 
restorative. When we consider the beneficial influence 
■which snuff has exerted over mankind generally, we cannot 
help regretting that its virtues were not sooner known. 

" For we put forth the proposition seriously, that its 
effect upon the world has been to render it more humane and 
even-tempered, and that had the western hemisphere dis- 
covered the tobacco plant earlier, historians would have had 
more pleasant events to chronicle. For instance, it is not 
impossible — nay, most probable — that the fate of Rome, dis- 
cussed by the Triumvirate over their snuff-boxes, would have 
been difl'erent. Is it likely that, under the humanizing influ- 
ence of mutual pinches, Antony would have asked for, or 
Augustus resigned, the head of Cicero to his bloodthirsty 
colleague ; or that the other details of the conscription which 
deluged the streets of Rome with the blood of her best 
citizens, would have been agreed to? Again, can any one 
imagine Charles the ]^inth and his evil counsellors plotting 
the massacre of St. Bartholomew over pinches of the soothing 
dust? Is it probable that the High Court of Justiciary 
would have entitled its royal martyr to a special service in 
the Book of Common Prayer, if its deliberation had been 
inspired by the kindly snuff which since that time has so 
often softened the rigor of the law ? My hypothesis may seem 
an absurd one, but history supports it. 

"When Charles the Second introduced snuff into general 
use, men's hands had scarcely adapted themselves to more 
peaceable occupations than cuttiug their neighbors' throats, 
and the ashes of a long and bitter civil war needed little fan- 
ning to break into a blaze again ; and yet, for forty years of 
misgovernment the nation kept its temper. How can this 
forbearance be accounted for ? Was it that circumstances no 
longer called for as stern and as effectual remedies as before ? 
'No. Was the second Charles one whit more desirable than 
the first of that ilk ? Was Clarendon more liked than Staf- 
ford ? was Russell's head of less consequence than Prynne's 
ears ? No. Again, wrongs as grievous as those which Hamp- 
den had died in resisting were to be avenged, but in a milder, 
better fashion ; for mankind had in the meantime learned to 
take snuff. Much of the haste and irritation which had pre- 
viously led to blows discharged itself in a good-natured 
Bneeze. Snuff made men forbearing, even jocular over their 
wrongs. Who can doubt that the revolution which ended in 
placing William of Orange on his father-in-law's throne owed 



254r A PREVENTIVE OF ANGER. 

its bloodless character not a little to the influence of snuff. 
We read of difiicnlties in its course, which, fifty years previ- 
ously, would inevitably have led to bloodshed, being easily, 
almost humorously surmounted. The plagued nation effected 
a revolution over its snuff-boxes in the happiest conceivable 
manner. 

" Having ventured so far I am inclined to put forward a 
yet higher claim which snuff has upon our gratitude, and to 
hint that the great deeds of great men who were snuff-takers 
may be traced by a chain of reasoning — slight, yet conclusive 
— to this dearly prized luxury. The hackneyed saying that 
time is money, or money's worth, has more truth in it than 
most of the fallacies which are supposed to regulate our con- 
duct. The most important events of our lives often hinge on 
moments. A moment to stifle passion, to summon reflection, 
to plunge into the past and bring up a buried memory, to 
consider results, is often of the utmost consequence, and this 
valued moment the pinch of snuff" insures, when, without it, 
delay would be simply embarrassment. The pinch of snuff, 
taken at the right instant, secures an important reprieve, 
during which the unpleasant question may be evaded, the 
hasty reply reconsidered, or an angry repartee thought better 
of, while the same time gained serves to improve the diplo- 
matist's equivoque^ to point the orator's satire, and polish the 
wit's mot. In a word, its use on important occasions affords, 
to every one who needs them, better means of acting upon 
Talleyrand's mischievous yet clever aphorism — that language 
is useful rather to conceal than to express our thoughts. 
Moreover, the action necessary in conveying the tempting 
graces to their destination has not unfrequently been found 
useful. It employs the hasty hand that may itch to take 
illegal vengeance for fancied insults ; it serves to hide the 
angry twitching mouth and passionately expanding nostrils, 
to give a natural expression to changes of the countenance 
which would otherwise indicate emotion, and to parry atten- 
tion till reason has been summoned to supplant passion. 

" It is denied (in a rather irritating way sometimes) that 
the subject of our article has any beneficial influence upon 
the intellects of its patrons. We are not about to claim for 
it any such exalted qualities, but we may be allowed to men- 
tion a fact or so which entitles it to some respect medicinallj'. 
As we have before stated, in its early days it was considered 
to possess powerful healing qualities, and even now is found 
of use in cases of headache and weak sight. It was also 



A NATIONAL STIMULANT. 



255 



supposed valuable in cases of heaviness and obtuseness of 
intellect. Is it, therefore unreasonable to presume that it 
may have had some share in gaining for our brethren beyond 
the Tweed that shrewdness of national character which has 
become proverbial ? 

" The specimens which came in the reign of James I., 




HEADACHB. 



southward, did not command much respect or admiration 
from our countrymen ; indeed they were the bulls at which 
every satirist hurled his shafts, and blunt must have been 
that one which did not pierce some potent folly of language 
or manner. The town rang with anecdotes of their rags, 
beggary, and quarrels ; ballad-singers made merry at their 
expense, and the stage resounded with uncomplimentary 
allusions. Indeed, in one of the most popular plays of that 
period, the king himself was not spared, and the actors (Ben 
Jonson among them) had very nearly lost their ears for their 
boldness. Nor was it at least for a hundred and fifty years 
after this period that the Scotch became noted for that enter- 
prise and talent which now distinguish them. 

"We do not deny that the union may have developed 



256 SNEEZING. 

their traits, but it is clear that within that time snuff had 
become a national stimulant. To the observer of men and 
manners there is something very characteristic in the various 
fashions in which the pinch of snuff is taken. ' The exer- 
cise of the snuff-box,' as it was once termed, was an acknowl- 
edged science, but few were the great proficients who could 
mutely express their feelings by its aid. We have not space 
to run through all its exercise, but we may mention the 
' pinch military,' which Frederick, and after him, Napoleon 
practiced inhaling snuff copiously, and with much waste, as 
though it were human life they were throwing away; the 
* pinch malicious,' of which Pope was perfect master ; the 
' pinch dictatorial,' which burly Jonson established ; the 
' pinch sublimely contemptuous,' such as Reynolds took 
when some travelling virtuoso hinted at excellence away 
from Leicester-square, and ruffled his complacent vanity ; 
and, above all, the ' pinch polite,' which Talleyrand understood 
80 well. 

"From snuff to sneezing is but a step, which we purpose 
taking before we bring this cursory article to a close. The 
act of sneezing appears to have been variously regarded at 
various stages of the world's history, but from the earliest 
times of which we have any authentic record, it has been 
the customs of those around to give vent to a short benedic- 
tion immediately upon its commission. The Robbins con- 
feidering themselves bound to find a reason for this universal 
custom, and being hard pressed, gave the somewhat incom- 
prehensible explanation that, previous to Jacob, man sneezed 
but once in his lifetime, and then immediately before death ; 
BO that those around, warned of his imminent journey, 
hastened to wish it a good termination. How it was that 
Jacob instituted a new order of things we are not told, but 
as a proof of the truth of their assertion they give the fact 
that in all nations of the earth a similar custom will be found 
existing. 

" Strangely enough this assertion was corroborated by the 
first colonists of America, who found the habit to be in com- 
mon use amongst the aboriginal tribes. The Glreeks and 
Bomans certainly had a similar habit, but far from attaching 
any ill-omen to the sneeze they regarded it as of good augury. 
Thus Catullus assures us that when Cupid upon a memorable 
occasion sneezed, all : 

' The little loves that waited by 
Bowed and blessed the augury. 



DIFFERENT TASTES. 



257 



And in the' Life of Themistocles,' Plutarch informs his readers 
that sneezing by the General on the eve of a battle was 
regarded as a certain sign of conquest. Strangely enough 
we find that in comparatively modern times, the custom of 
giving expression to good wishes when a friend sneezed was 
attributed to the fearful plague which periodically swept 
over Europe. Sneezing was one of its first and most dan- 
gerous symptoms, and those who were by, as they gathered 
their robes about them and fled from their doomed fellow- 
creature, w^ould ejaculate a quick ' God bless you,' hurriedly 
invoking from a more merciful quarter the aid they feared 
to give. Violent sneezing was not only among the first, but 
was one of the last fatal signs of that fearful scourge, and 
was often too rapidly followed by death to give time for more 
than a short benediction. Anyhow, the custom still exists and 
one of the most pleasant reminiscences attached to the first 
pinch of snuff is the chorus of hearty good wishes of sympa- 
thizing friends which follows upon the inevitable sneeze." 

The variety of taste in snuff is accounted for by the prov- 
erb, " So many men to so many noses." Highland gentle- 
men of every degree are mostly fond of Gillespie ; while 




HIGHLANDERS. 



operatives from the Lowlands generally prefer plain Scotch. 
"When two Highlanders meet, they usually exchange a pinch 
17 



258 RISE AND PROGRESS OF SNUFF-TAKING. 

of snuff, miitnaWj preeing the contents of their mulls, while 
their colleys, (dogs) after a fashion of their own, take a 
reciprocal sniff oi each other, Cuba is the favorite of the 
gentlemen of the stock exchange ; the tradesman's box 
usually contains rappee ; high dried Irish is grateful to those 
who love to feel the taste of snuff in their throat. Sea-faring 
men seldom take snuff : a sailor with a snuff-box is as rarely 
to be met with as a sailor without a knife. 

The history of the rise and progress of snuff-taking abounds 
in incidents and anecdotes, among the most curious of all 
that relate to the various modes of using the weed. Though 
once the most popular and fashionable manner of using 
tobacco it now falls far behind the other and more common 
and more popular forms of indulging in the herb. In France 
and Spain the introduction of tobacco ushered in this form of 
using it, and to inhale a few grains of the pungent dust was 
the delight of polished and favored courtiers who regardless 
of the forms royalty patronized and gave sanction to the 
custom. Thus its use in a short time became popular all 
over Europe and gave unlimited scope for the satirist and 
dramatist to ridicule the habit. In spite, however, of frown 
and ridicule this ancient custom though not now as popular 
or as fashionable, still claims many sincere votaries and 
doubtless will as long as the plant is cultivated or used in any 
form. 




CHAPTER IX. 

CIGAKS. 

' The poet may sing of the leaf of the rose, 
And call it the purest and sweetest that blows ; 
But of all the leaves that ever were tried, 
Give me the tobacco leaf rolled up and dried." 

HE smoking of cigars is now considered the best 
as it is the most fashionable mode of using the weed. 
The word cigar is from the Spanish cigarro, and 
signifies a cylindrical roll of tobacco leaves, made of 
short pieces or shreds of the leaves divested of the stem 
and wound about with a binder, and enveloped in a portion 
of the leaf known by the name of wrapper — acute at one 
end and truncated at the other. In the East Indies a sort 
of cigar called cheroot is also made with both ends truncated. 
The smoking of tobacco in the form of cigars is doubtless the 
most general as well as the most ancient mode of its use. 
When Columbus landed in Hispaniola, the sailors saw the 
natives smoking the leaves of a plant, " the perfume of which 
was fragrant and grateful." But while cigars are of very 
ancient origin in the West Indies, they were not generally 
known in Europe until the beginning of the Nineteenth 
Century. In fact, of all the various works on gastronomy 
and the pleasures of the table, written and published from 
1800 to 1815, not one speaks of this now indispensable 
adjunct of a good dinner. Even Britlat-Savarin, in his 

259 



260 ANCIENT DESCRIPTION. 

Physiologie du Gout, entirely ignores tobacco and all its 
distractions and charms. Benzo gives the following account 
of the manufacture of a cigar in Hispaniola : — 

" They take a leafe from the stalks of their great bastard 
corn (which we commonly called Turkie — wheat) together 
with one of these tobacco-leaves and fold them up together 
like a coffin of paper, such as grocers make to put spices in, 
or like a small organ-pipe. Then putting one end of the 
same coffin to the fire, and holding the other end in their 
mouths, they draw their breath to them. When the fire 
hath once taken at the pipe's end, they draw forth so much 
smoke that they have their mouth, nose, throat, and head 
full of it ; and, as if they tooke a singular delight therein 
they never leave supping and drinking till they can sup no 
more, and thereby loose their breath and their feeling." 

Sahagun, in his " History of New Spain," speaks of the 
natives as using the leaves of tobacco rolled into cigars, which 
they ignite and smoke in tubes of tortoise-shell or silver. 
The following article from the Wew Yorh Times contains 
much valuable information in regard to cigars, especially 
Havanas : 

" It is perfectly safe to say that there is more money spent 
every day in New York for cigars than for bread," (doubted.) 
"From the fine gentlemen, who buy their cigars at Del- 




monico's, or get them direct from the importers, down to the 
little barefoot boys in the streets, who buy theirs from the 
Chinamen at the corners or pick up the stumps that are 
thrown away, all smoke. In some countries pipes and 
cigarettes are made to do duty by the poorer classes, but in 
New York cigars seem to be almost invariably preferred. 
Now, while there is nothing better, in the way of something 
to smoke, than a first-class Havana cigar, there is nothing 
nastier than some of the cheap abominations made in that 
shape in New York. To the truth of this last proposition, 
anyone will readily testify who has ever been so unfortunate 



NEW YORK CIGARS. 



261 



as to have had to ride from Harlem to New York in a late 
emoking-car, with half a dozen roughs smoking cheap cigars 
on board. 

" The cigars sold in this market may be divided into three 
classes — the imported, those made of imported tobacco, and 
those made of domestic tobacco. These may be again classi- 
fied under many different heads, as there are many kinds and 
grades of each. The cheapest cigars in New York are dis- 
pensed by dilapidated Chinamen, who have little stands 
about the streets and markets. These are certainly the vilest 
cigars made anywhere in the world, and are sold from one to 
five cents each. Next in order come the common domestic 
cigars. They are sold at five cents each, or six for twenty- 
five cents, and are of the kind kept at the cheap refreshment 
stalls, lager beer saloons, and low groggeries. After these 
are the more pretentious home-made cigars, manufactured of 
selected domestic tobacco, which are sold all over the city, 
and in the making of which Havana ' fillers ' are supposed to 
be used. A filler, be it known, in technical parlance means 
that portion of the tobacco of which the inside of the cigar 
is made. Price, ten to fifteen cents. Then comes the best 
class of cigars in which domestic tobacco is used, those which 
are made with clear Havana fillers and Connecticut wrap- 
pers. Fifteen cents is the price, and many are palmed off 
on the unwise for the real imported article. Cigars made 
wholly of imported Cuban tobacco come next on the list. 
Some of them are excellent, and compare favorably with 
many of the imported. They bring from fifteen to fifty cents 
each at the cigar stores. Last in line, but best of all, is the 
genuine, imported Havana cigar. Few and rare are they,j 
and great is tlie price of the higher grades thereof. 

" There are some places in New York where an importedl 
cigar of a reasonable size may be bought for fifteen cents, 
but they are few and far between. Twenty or twenty-five 
cents is the price usually charged, and from that to a dollar. 
All the cigars made in the United States are invariably put 
up in imitation Havana boxes, with imitation Havana labels 
and brands. It is doubtful, however, whether this transparent 
device deceives anybody, for in accordance with the United 
States Internal Revenue laws, all boxes of cigars manufac- 
tured in the United States must not only bear the manufac- 
turer's label, giving his full name and place of business, and 
the number of his manufactory, but they must also bear the 
United States inspector's brand. Before the present law was 
in force, and the duties on tobacco were low, this scheme 



262 INCIDENTS. 

may have been profitable. But why the practice is still 
adhered to by the manufacturers is hard to imagine, for the 
boxes now used, being made of imported cedar, must be very 
costly, and must materially increase the price of cigars. 
Only those of the very poorest quality are packed in white 
wooden boxes. 

" Some people seem to smoke not because they like it, but 
only to be in the fashion. Some days ago the writer of this 
article happened to be in a cigar-store, when two well-dressed 
young men came in and asked for some ten cent cigars. The 
clerk handed out the box, and after a critical inspection the 
purchaser asked : " Are these medium V ' Yes, sir,' said the 
clerk. ' Then I'll take a dollar's worth.' After they had 
gone the writer asked the clerk what they meant by ' medium.' 
He said he didn't exactly know, but supposed they wanted 
to know whether the cigars were between strong and mild. 
*I told them they were,' said he, 'because I thought they 
would buy if I said so, but they are all alike.' And in this 
connection it is very singular that although the Island of 
Cuba is so near to the United States and so many cigars are 
imported into this city, so little is known about the different 
sizes and brands of cigars, excepting, of course, by those in 
the business. It is a common thing here to see a man ask in 
a cigar store for a I^lor del Fumar, a Figaro, or an Espanola. 
By this he means a cigar of a certain size, ^nd doe,s not seem 
to know that these are not the names which designate the 




CIGAR-HOLDERS. 



size, but are the names of the manufactories. In Havana, 
were a man to ask for a Flor del FumaVy the dealer would 
ask him what size he wanted. 



HAVANA CIGARS. 263 

" Every box of cigars packed in Havana ha-s, at least, six 
distinctive works on it. First is the brand, which is burned 
in the upper side of the lid of the box, with an iron made for 
the purpose; second the label, this bears the name and 
address of the manufactory ; third, the mark designating the 
size and shape of the cigars, this is usually put on with a 
stencil ; there are not so very many regular sizes, or vitolas, 
made in Havana as might be imagined, a list of them may 
prove interesting. These are : Damos, Entre Actos, Opera, 
Concha, Regalia de Concha, Londres, Londres de Corte, 
Regalia de Londres, Regalia Britanica, Regalia del Rey, 
Regalia de la Reina, Reina Victoria, Panetelos, Trabucos, 
Embajadores, Especiales, Imperiales, Brevos, Prensados, 
Cilindrados, Millar Vegueros. The Damos (Dames) as their 
name indicates, are meant for the ladies, and are the smallest 
made. The Cozadores (huntsmen) are the longest, and 
the Trabucos (blunderbusses) the fattest. The Prensa- 
dos (pressed) are flat, and Cilindrados (cylindrical) are so 
called because, when green, they are put in bundles of twenty- 
five, and tightly rolled in strong tissue paper, which is twisted 
at each end of the roll. When the cigars are dry the paper 
is taken oif, and the bunch retains the cylindrical shape given 
it. The Brevos (figs) are also tied up while green, and 
and tightly pressed. This makes them stick together some- 
thing like figs, hence their name. The Vegueros (plantation) 
take their name from the fact that they are supposed to be 
made like those made on the plantations, but they are not 
made in the same way, 

" In the Vegos (plantations) the veguero, or planter, makes 
his cigar of a single leaf of tobacco, which he carries ready 
moistened for the purpose, by rolling it on his knee. Besides 
the above, some fancy sizes have been adopted of late years, 
but they are made by only a few of the larger manufacturers 
in Havana. Fourth is the color mark, which is also put on 
in stencil. Fifth, the class mark. All the round cigars made 
in Havana are separated into three classes: Primera, or 
first ; Segunda, or second ; and Tercera, or third. Some 
manufacturers never mark any of their cigars as of the third 
class, not because they do not make them, but because they 
think they sell better without the mark. They make the 
first class Flor^ the second Primera, and the third Segunda. 
Others mark all their cigars as of the first class, and indicate 
the classes by the color of the labels, and in this way none 
but the wholesale purchaser knows the secret. Sixth, the 



264 QUALITIES OF HAVANA CIGARS. 

last, is the mark denoting the number of cigars in the box. 
This is stenciled on the side in Arabic numerals. 

" A theory has obtained that cigars made in Havana, by 
reason of some inexplicable climatic influence, are better 
than those made in New York, even should they be made of 
tobacco from the same plantation. This may be so, but it is 
doubtful whether this was ever fairly tested, or, indeed, 
whether it was ever tested at all. The truth is that all the 
best tobacco grown in the island of Cuba is bought up by the 
heavy manufacturers in Havana. The crops of the best 
plantations are contracted for in advance, and the old-estab- 
lished firms buy from the same vegos year after year. Hence 
it is why their cigars are so uniform in quality. All Cuban 
tobacco is not good, by any means. The tobacco from the 
Vuelta de Arriba is not so good as that from the Vuelta de 
Abajo, and yet there is but little difference in their geo- 
graphical position. And in the Yuelta de Abajo, a short 
distance makes a difference in the quality of the tobacco. 
Some vegos are celebrated for their good crops, while others, 
perhaps not a hundred yards away, do not produce good 
crops at all. There are many poor cigars made in Cuba, as 
all who have ever been there know, and all over the island 
the Havana cigar is deemed the best. In Havana, and, 
indeed, in all parts of the island, green or freshly-made 
cigars are preferred, and the most esteemed cigar-cases are 
made of carefully prepared bladders, in which the cigars are 
rolled to prevent the evaporation of the moisture. 

" When a Cuban gentleman gives a cigar to a friend, he 
does not, as we do, open his case, and offer it to him to 
choose from but he examines its contents carefully and 
critically, selects the one he thinks the best and oifers it. 
And there is a great deal more in the choice of a cigar, by 
selecting it on account of its outside appearance, than one 
not accustomed to it would suppose. A wrapper which has 
that which the Cubans call calidad makes the cigar much 
stronger than one which does not possess it. That is to say, 
that the wrapper which has calidad contains more essential 
oil, is denoted by an abundance of small pustules on the sur- 
face of the leaf, and by a general rich, oily appearance. As 
a proof of the foregoing proposition, it is only necessary to 
know how cigars are made. A lot of tobacco is worked up 
into say 50,000. After they are all made, they are turned 
over to be assorted, according to color and class, and are 
packed and marked. The fillers are all alike, it is the 



RELATIVE VALUE AND SIZE. 265 

wrappers that make the difference. To assort the colors a 
very, correct eye is required, and those who do this part of the 
work make better wages than those who make the cigars. 

" The value of cigars does not increase in direct ratio with 
their size, for owing to the difficulty in getting good wrap- 
pers for the larger kinds, the expense of their manufacture 
is much increased. Upon one occasion, in Havana, a man- 
ufacturer received an order for a thousand cigars intended 
for the Queen of Spain's husband, Don Francisco de Asis, 
which he agreed to make for $1,000. They were delivered 
in due time, and packed in a richly-mounted cedar chest, 
were sent to the royal recipient. They were magnificent 
cigars, of the cazadores size, all of the same color, and so 
smoothly made as to look as if they had been turned out of 
hard wood instead of rolled tobacco. They were placed on 
exhibition for a few days before they were sent to Spain, 
and a gentleman who saw them, wishing to make a present to 
some dignitary, asked the manufacturer to make him a 
a like number at the same price. To his surprise, the order 
was refused. The manufacturer said he could not do it for 
the money. His explanation was that it was not the actual 
cost of the tobacco and labor of making them, but it was on 
account of the trouble and expense met with in selecting the 
wrappers. He said he had to pick over thousands of bales 
before he could secure a sufficient number of the proper 
length, color, and fineness. 

" Some two years ago there was a story of a Cuban cigar- 
dealer in Broadway, who selected cigars for his more favored 
customers by ear. It was said that he put the cigar to his 
ear, and listened intently for a moment, and by the cracking 
of the tobacco was enabled to judge of its quality. This was 
a good advertising dodge, but in practice it was all nonsense. 
None but that wily Cuban ever heard of such a mode of try- 
ing a cigar. In the Island of Cuba that which we call a 
cigar is called a tabaco (a tobacco) and when it is required to 
discriminate between the manufactured and unmanufactured 
article it is called tabaco torcido, or rolled tobacco. This, 
however, is only necessary when used in the plural. In 
Mexico a cigar is called a puro, and in Peru* and some of 
the other Spanish American countries it is called a cigarro 
puro, in contradistinction to the cigarro de papel^ or cigarette. 

• Ballaert says that the consumption of cigars in Peru is enormous. " An old fisherman 
on being asked how he amused himself when not at his labors, replied, ' Why I smoke ; and 
aa 1 have consumed 40 paper cigars a day for the last 50 years, which cost me one rial each 
frill you have the goodness to tell me how many I have smoked, and how much I hare 
expended for tobacco ? ' " 



266 



TOBACCO IN MEXICO. 



Cigarettes in Cuba are called cigarros, and their consump- 
tion is enormous. Strange as it may appear, there are some 
confirmed smokers in Cuba who never use cigars at all, but 
confine themselves to cigarettes. To the New Yorker it 
looks curious to see a great, bearded man smoking a tiny 
cigarette ; and, indeed were he to smoke his cigarette as the 
New Yorker would smoke his cigar, it would be labor lost, so 
far as getting any effect of the tobacco was concerned. But 
the cigarette smoker inhales the greater part of the smoke, it 
goes directly into his lungs, and into contact with a large 
surface of mucous membrane, and, indeed, with the blood 
itself. Were the New York cigar-makers to smoke a cigar- 
ette in the same way it would make him so giddy that he 
would be compelled to give it up long before it was consumed. 
That the smoke does go into the lungs is proved by the fact 
that a cigarette smoker can inhale the smoke and exhale it 
again after drinking a glass of water." 

All tobacco grown upon the island of Cuba is not of the 
finest quality ; the majority of it is far inferior to the best 




LIFE IN MEXICO. 



Mexican coast tobacco. The value of the tobacco lands of 
this last mentioned country has not been fully developed. 



CIGAR-MAKERS. 267 

The variety of soil, exposure, climate, and atmospheric 
influences are greater than can possibly be in Cuba, and when 
the best is discovered, combining all the requisites, which 
undoubtedly will be the case with an increased culture of the 
plant, it will be found to be equal to the Vuelta Abogo of 
Cuba, and much more extensive. The subject of tobacco 
lands, evidently, is not well understood in Mexico, as it must 
be, from great experience, in Cuba. All of these varieties 
of lands and circumstances exist in Mexico, and it is safe to 
predict that, at some day, this country will stand pre-eminent 
over all others in this industry. 

We extract the following from the Tobacco Leaf in 
regard to cigar-making in Cuba : — 

" The rule is that a cigar-maker devotes all his ingenuity 
and diligence to one class of goods. For example, one work- 
man makes only Londres ; another only Regalias ; another 
only Milores Communes ; and so on. In the Cuban's factory 
the operatives are alloM^ed to smoke as many cigars as they 
like when at work ; and to take home with them, when they 
leave work in the evening, five cigars each. The immigra- 
tion of Chinese laborers into Cuba has modified, and must 
further modify, the labor market there. In the cigarette 
factories at Havana, Chinese workmen are almost exclusively 
employed. Though objectionable for many of their moral 
habits, these workmen are nevertheless docile, ingenious, 
laborious, and contented." 

A writer, alluding to the manufacture of cigars, says : — 

" The colors or strengths are Amarillo ClarOj bright yel- 
low ; Amarillo Ohscuro^ dark yellow ; Claro, bright ; Colorado 
Claro, bright red ; Colorado^ red ; Colorado OhscurOy dark 
red ; Colorado Maduro, red-ripe or mellow ; Maduro, ripe or 
mellow ; Maduro Obscuro, dark ripe or mellow ; Pajiso 
Claro, bright straw-colored ; Pajizo, straw-colored ; Pajizo 
ObsGuro, dark straw-colored ; Fuerte^ strong or heavy ; J^ntre 
Fuerte, rather strong or heavy ; Flajo, light. Then there 
are the indications of the qualities : — Superfine ; Firo, not 
quite so fine ; Flor, finest or firsts ; Superior, next, or seconds ; 
JBitenos, next, or thirds. The cigar has a notable history. 
First has to be determined the part of the plant from which 
it is taken ; then the part of the leaf from which it is taken, 
the tobacco being best which is furthest away from the 



268 



CUBAN CIGARS. 



root or middle of the leaf. One elaborate process follows 
another for the perfection of a work of art — for as such we 
must regard a cigar." 

Hazard, in his admirable work on Cuba, devotes consider- 
able space to cigars, their manufacture, varieties, and use, in 
which he speaks of the various brands as follows : — 

" The brands known as ' Yara Mayau^ and the ' Guisa^ 
are perhaps the most celebrated made upon the Island. Of 
the ' Yara^ which has some considerable reputation, partic- 
ularly in the London market, I confess I cannot speak favor- 
ably. Cigars that I smoked made from this leaf, and which 
are much smoked in the vicinity of Santiago de Cuba, I 
found had a peculiar saline taste which was very unpleasant, 
as also a slight degree of bitterness ; many smokers, however, 
become very fond of this flavor. rWhen I state that in 
Havana alone there are over one Hundred and twenty-five 
manufacturers of cigars, it will readily be understood there 
must be a great many inferior cigars made even in Cuba. 
. Havana may be called the ' City of cigars,' from its reput^- 
/ tion and the immense number of factories there are in it for 
' the manufacture of cigars, from the smallest shop opening 
on the street, employing three or four hands to the immense 
fairicos erected expressly for this purpose, and employing 
live or six hundred. 

"Let not any one imagine, then, that because he is in 
Havana he will get no poor cigars, for a greater mistake can 
^ . . ^^-^ ^ -^-* -.y not be made, for 



jnst as vile trash 
can there be pur- 
chased as a n y 
where ; and it 
appeared to me 
that in buying, 
from time to time 
in different 
fdbricos, a few 
cigars it was 
rarely I found a 
really good one. 
It behooves, 
then, every lover 
of a good cigar 
to make himself 




CUBAW CIGAR SHOP. 



familiar with the best makers and brands, and to purchase 



CIGAR FACTORIES. 269 

those, and those only, that suit his tasteV To the traveler in 
Havana, this is easy enough, as he can there buy sample 
boxes from any of the iactories and of any of the brands. 
There are, in addition to these hundreds of other cigar factories, 
Bome of which, such as Cabargos, Figaros, Luetanos, Vic- 
torias, etc., are first-class, three or four at least in whose 
cigars every smoker may have perfect confidence, the brands 
of which are known all over the world. These are : CdbanoSy 
Uppmann and Partagas; for whose brands, perhaps, one 
pays something more, but has always the satisfaction of find- 
ing them good. To the kindness of the gentlemen connected 
with some of these factories I am indebted for most of the 
information in this article, and particularly to Senor Don 
Avulmo G. del Yalle, the present proprietor of the Cabaiios 
Factory, who was good enough to show me through his 
establishment, carefully explaining to me its peculiarities. 
As the process of manufacture and description of grades and 
qualities are the same with all the best makers, I give here 
a detailed history of this factory and its products. 

" The factory for Cabaiios cigars has been established 
seventy-two years the founder of it being Don Francisco 
Cabanos, his son, Don de P. Cabaiios, succeeding him, to whom 
has succeeded his son-in-law, Senor del Valle, the present 
proprietor and director of the factory. When it was founded, 
the cigars were sold to the public in bundles of twenty, only 
amounting to a total number per year, of four or five hun- 
dred thousand cigars, the sales of which kept constantly 
increasing until 1826, when there were sold two millions. 
At this period the demand for exportation commenced, 
increasing each year until 1848, when the number sold 
amounted to three and a half millions. At this time, the 
present director came in charge, and increased the sale to 
eight millions per year, until, in 1866, the total sales by this 
one house only, amounted to the enormous number of six- 
teen million cigars, which went to difierent parts of the 
world. The tobacco manipulated in this factory is, with 
some few exceptions, that grown upon plantations in the 
Vuelta Abojo, with the proprietors of which Senor del Valle 
has a special contract for their product. The most noted of 
these places are known as ' La Lena^ ' San Jtian aj Martin,^ 
' Los Pilotos^ ' Rio Hondo!! The firm also own three vegaSy 
as do also Partagas, Uppmann, and others, in a greater or 
less degree. The amount raised upon these vegas in connec- 
tion with the Cabanos Factory, amounts to five thousand 



270 PREPARATION OF THE TOBACCO. 

bales, of from first to eighth quality, leaving the most 
inferior qualities, which amount to about one thousand bales, 
for exportation, the factory not using such common grades. 
It is a custom of the manufacturers to keep a supply of the 
best qualities always on hand from year to year, in order 
that, should the tobacco crop, in any one year, be bad, the 
reputation of the house can be maintained by using the good 
tobacco in the store. The factory is a large stone building, 
opposite the Canipo de Moste, in which all the operations 
connected with cigar making are carried on (excepting the 
manufacture of boxes) by over five hundred operatives, all 
males. The following is the process of manufacture : 

" Arrived at the factory, the tobacco bales, carefully packed 
and wrapped in palm leaves, are kept in a cool, dark, place 
on the first floor, being divided off into classes according to 
quality and value, which latter varies from twenty to four 
hundred dollars per bale of two hundred pounds. When 
wanted, the bales are opened, the manojas and gabillos are 
separated, and the latter carried in their dry state to the 
moistening room. Here are a number of men whose busi- 
ness it is to place the leaves, for the purpose of moistening 
and softening them, into large barrels in which is a solution 
of saltpetre in water ; this done, the water is poured off, and 
other workmen spread out the leaves with their hands upon 
the edges of the barrels, ridding them as much as possible, 
of any surplus water ; after which, the leaves, from being 
moistened, unfold very easily, and, with care, without tear- 
ing. The stem is then taken out, the process being known 
as disbalillar. These stems, with the refuse of other tobacco, 
are sometime used as filling for the commonest kind of cigars. 
The filling is known as tripa, the very best being selected, 
like the leaf, for the best cigars. Now comes the maker, 
and supplying himself with a handful of leaf {copa) for 
wrappers, and a lot of the tripa for filling or really making 
the body of the cigar itself he carries it to a little table, and 
spreading the wrapper upon the table, cuts with a short 
knife the different portions of the leaf. This is a very nice 
operation, requiring skill, knowledge, and experience ; for it 
is in this operation that the different qualities of tobacco are 
separated, the outside of the leaf being generally the best ; 
next that, another quality ; and that portion adjoining the 
stem the worst. 

" The general sorting of the tobacco is done by hands of 
great experience and judgment, who are the highest in 




SORTING OF LEAVES. 271 

consideration in the factories, some of them receiving large 
pay ; thus for instance, the official escq^edor, or chooser, gets 
from five to seven dollars (gold) per day, and the torcedores, or 
twisters, from two to four, the workmen being paid so much 
per thousand cigars, generally from two to four dollars. To 
show how very careful the maker must be in cutting out the 
leaf to make the most of it : Mr. del Yalle was explaining 
to me the process of manufacture, and directed the maker 
to cut the leaf. This the man did drawing his knife in the 
manner denoted by the dotted lines in the engraving. This 
it appears was not making the most 
of the fine part of the leaf, for Mr. 
del Yalle, annoyed, took the knife 
himself, and after rating the maker 
soundly for his carelessness, showed 
him how to cut it properly, as defined 
by the black line, the difierence 
being, as far as I could judge, a slight 
TOBACCO LEAF. inequality of color between the two 

parts. The manufacture of the cigar 
is very simple. The cigar maker, being seated before a low 
work table, which has raised ledges on every side except that 
nearest him, takes a leaf of tobacco, spreads it out smoothly 
before him, and cuts it as in the drawing. He then lays a 
few fragments of tobacco {tripa) in the centre or a leaf strip 
and rolls the whole into the shape of a cigar, and taking 
then a wrapper, rolls it spirally around the cigar. If the 
workman is skillful, he makes it of Just the right length and 
size, without any trimming of the knife. The cigars are 
assorted, counted, and done up in bundles of generally 
twenty-five each, and then packed in the boxes, ready for 
market, under their different names of Londres, JRegalias, 
etc. These names are generally understood to have the 
same meaning throughout the trade, the ' Yegueros^ for 
instance, being the plantation cigars, made at the regas, and 
much esteemed by smokers, though they are rarely to be 
met with for sale, or, if so, at an exhorbitant price. The 
^Regalia Irwperial^ the finest and best, is nearly seven, 
inches long, the price varying from one hundred and fifty 
to three hundred dollars per thousand (gold). The ' Regalia ' 
is not so large but fine, the ' Trabuco^ short and thick ; the 
* Londres^ the most convenient in shape, and most smoked 
in this country and England ; the ' Dama ' the small sized one 
used by ladies(?) or by men between acts of the opera {entr* 



272 SALES, &c. 

operas). There are also other names which each factory has 
for some particular kinds. Artificial flavors are given to 
cigars, when some particular taste is to be satisfied, by the 
use of flavoring extracts. Each of the above names has 
different qualities, as : 

Londres *■ sujperjmie ' the very best of that size (delicious). 

" ^Jmo,^ not quite so fine. 

" '' flor^ finest, or firsts. 

" ' superior^ next, or seconds. 

" ' hxienos^ next, or thirds. 
Again, tbese dift'erent qualities have different colors, known 
as : ' fnaduro^ strongest ; ' oscuro,^ strong (dark) ; ' Colorado^ 
medium ; ' claro^ mild ; ' Brevors^ means pressed. Thus, 
supposing one wanted a good cigar to suit his taste, he 
would perhaps order: 'Partagas' (maker), 'londres' (size), 
*flor' (quality), 'Colorado' or 'oscuro' (strength), and he 
would get a good cigar, nice size, best quality, not too strong, 
or too mild. 

" I must confess to a weakness for the Uppmann cigars, 
which 1 have found, without exception, to be good, and 
which have a fine reputation throughout the "West Indies. 
A millionaire need not want a better cigar to smoke than 
their ' Londres superfine^ at sixty dollars (gold) per thousand, 
in Havana, or their ' Casadores, at fifty dollars. Partagas 
cigars of course, every one knows are good ; and he keeps 
generally pretty well sold up, but fills orders as they come 
in. For a new experience, one of his ' JRegalio Reyno flor^ 
is something to try, even if they do cost out there eighty- 
five dollars, gold. 

" In all the factories they make about the following rates : 
For every order of ten thousand, costing fifty dollars per 
thousand, five per cent, discount is allowed. Less than five 
thousand will pay five dollars extra. I should, perhaps, 
mention that no distinction is made to dealers, the only 
advantage they have over the private buyer is, that they are 
enabled to get the discount for large lots. The absurd 
notion so prevalent with us, that the Cubans only smoke 
their cigars green, is an error, since the leaf is entirely dried 
in the sun before being touched by the manufacturer. The 
Cubans are very particular indeed to preserve the aroma and. 
fragrance of the cigars, by keeping them in wrappers of 
oiled and soft silks ; it is, in fact, quite a sight to see with 
what ceremony some of these are produced at gentlemen's 
tables, with much unction, like the ushering in of old wine. 



LARGE FACTORIES. 5^73 

My chapter on cigars would be incomplete did I fail to note 
tlie beautiful and courteous way in which all Cubans no 
matter of what position, whether the exquisite at the club, 
or the portero at the door, ask you for a light. ' Do me the 
favor Senor ? ' and you present your cigar, the lighted end 
towards the speaker. He takes the cigar delicately between 
his thumb and fore-finger, lights his own, and then, with a 
quick, graceful motion, turns yours in his fingers, presenting 
you, with another wave, the mouth end, makes you a hand 
salute, utters his gracios, and leaves you studying out the 
'motions' and thinking what a charming thing is national 
politeness." 

In the selection of leaves for the manufacture of cigars in 
the factories only the large fine ones are used for Regalias^ 
Imperiales, or Medios Regalias; and also for Cazadores, 
Panetelos, Imperiales, Cahalleros^ and so on ; the smaller 
fine leaves for Panetelos and Londres ; the dark inferior 
leaves for Canones. The commonest tobacco goes to form 
the Milores Communes / the worst is converted into cigars 
which are generally pressed flat, and known as Prinsados. 
For the smallest kind of Londres and for Damos, a propor- 
tionally small leaf is employed. 

In Cuba and Luzon, one of the Philippine Islands, is 
found one of the largest factories for cigars in the world. In 
Manilla there are three factories where 7,000 families and 
1,200 males are employed : one in Cavite, in which 5,000 
operatives, mostly females, are engaged ; and one in Malabar, 
which gives employment to about 2,000 more, also females. 
The tobacco is worked into both cigars and cheroots both of 
which have a variety of shapes. In both Manilla and Havana 
the custom of smoking is universal and one rarely meets 
with any of the male sex without a cigar between his lips. 

A writer speaking of the universality of the custom says : 

" In Havana, the custom of smoking is a universal one. 
There, young and old indulge freely in the use of the weed, 
dividing their attention pretty equally between the cigar 
and the cigarette. Even the ladies of the better class in 
many instances indulge ; though not to so great an extent as 
is commonly reported." 

" Smoking in Cuba " says an American writer, " is like the 
18 



274 



UNIVERSAL SMOKING. 



habit of making shoes in Lynn, Massachusetts, everybody 
smokes ! — in the house, and by the way ; in the cars, and on 
horseback ; everywhere, and at all times. You meet whole 
regiments of youngsters, from six to eight years of age, with 
black beaver hats, tail-coats, and canes, each with a cigar, 
nearly his own size, in bis mouth. You feel like putting the 
miniature dandies into the water of the next fountain basin, 
which shallow as it is, would fully, suffice to drown the largest 
of them." 

You have a right to accost any one smoking in the street, 
however much may be his superiority or inferiority to your- 
self, and to ask a light for your cigar ; even negroes hatless 
and shirtless, thus address well-dickied gentlemen, and vice 
versa. Kefuse to take a cigar with a Cuban, and you refuse 
his friendship. The negroes cannot work at all without 
their quota of cigars ; " and looking out of the windows of a 
room in that magnificent hotel ' ^l Telegrafo^ the writer 
remembers to have caught a glimpse more than once of the 
negro women at work in the laundry, every one of whom 

held a long cigar in 



her mouth, and pufied 
incessantly as the 
clothes were manipu- 
lated upon the wash- 
boards." In Havana, 
as throughout Cuba, 
there is a cigar eti- 
quette, to infringe any 
of the rules of which 
is construed as an in- 
sult. It is, for instance 
considered a breach 
of etiquette when you 
are asked for a light 
to hand your cigar without first knocking off the ashes. A 
greater breach, however, is to pass the cigar handed for you 
to obtain a light from, to a third party for a similar purpose ; 
the rule is to hand back the cigar with as graceful a wave as 




WENCHES SMOKING. 



CIGAR ETIQUETTE. 



275 



you can command, and then if necessary, pass your own 
cigar to the third party. 

The insult direct in cigar etiquette is for the party to 
whom you apply for a light, to pass on and leave you with 
the remains of his cigar, or to intimate to you, by word or 
action, that he has no further use for it, and that you can 
throw it away. In Cuba, where cigars are plentiful, the 
usual custom is, when you ask for a light, even if the party 
be a stranger, to pull out your case and offer him a cigar, by 
way of recognizing the civility in stopping to accommodate 
you. The Spaniards are naturally a polite people, and the 
stranger stepping into the Louvre and other public places of 
resort in Havana, is struck at once with the marked contrast 
in this respect to familiar gatherings elsewhere. In no place 
is a cigar more enjoyable than in Havana. Seated upon 
the roof of one of the large hotels in that city in a bright 
moonlight night, within hearing of the dreamy roll on the 
beach : the regular throb of the sea, lulling one into quiet- 




A MOONLIGHT REVKRIE IN HAVANA. 



ness ; the sigh of the summer breeze a lullaby to the senses ; 
while a high-flavored prime cigar, as it wastes and floats away 



276 REVERIES. 

in air, is the fairy wand which opens the enchanted gates of 
Reverie and Imagination. 

What need of a friend under such soothing circumstances ? 
What need of the jolly camarade of former days to sigh back 
sigh for sigh, puff for puff, and wander in gentle reminis- 
cences over the Lesbian labyrinth of the past, when Julia was 
most kind, or Cynthia, darling girl, delighted in the perfume 
of a capital havana ? Here, in this quaint old city by the 
sea, is the place for dreams and reveries and the utter render- 
ing of one's self up — to a good cigar. Is it not a place for 
reverie ? Has not one with this most respectable weed, this 
prime havana^ the concomitants of a thousand reveries ? Will 
not one puff of that narcotic breath drowse deep all watching 
dragons, and make for him the sleeping beauties of his will ? 
An^, prestOj there they are ! and, oh ! ye houris of the South, 
with what a smile and glance between the azure puffs ! Well 
let me not forget myself. With a sterner morality he sees 
how the bending Bedouin fashions his pipe in the moistened 
ground ; he sees the slender Indian reed with the flat bowls 
of Lahore and Oude, the pipe of the Anglo-eyed celestial, 
the red clay of Bengal, and the glittering gilded cups in which 
the dark-skinned races of Siam, the Malacca Isles, and the 
Phillippines, love to enshrine their dreamy opium-haunted 
spirits of the weed. He sees how in the squatter's hut the 
old squaw sits by her hunter lord, and puffs at the corn-cob 
sweetness, and how by lonely ways the traveler rests and 
thinks of home, and in the blue smoke greets once more the 
faces of the loved, perhaps forever gone. He sees how the 
Esquimaux, with his hollow Walrus-tooth, makes bearable 
the stifling squalor of his den ; or, sterner and graver still, 
some item of historic lore mingles rudely with his dreams, 
and elbows sharply the airy spirits of his smoke-engendered 
thoughts. Softly tremble in the delicate blue mist and the 
azure spirals from his old Virginia clay — the domes of a sea- 
bathed city. Loftily pierce the tall white minarets into the 
quivering heavens, while the solemn cypress throws its shade 
below. Before him, silent-paced as in a dream, files the 



SUMMER-DAY THOUGHTS. 



27T 



■weird array of Arab camels, bowing their long necks tufted 
with crimson braids, and measuring the brown sands of the 
desert with ghost-like tread. 'Tis the moon of Egypt and 
the waters of the Nile ; 'tis the palm-bough waves for him ; 
and women, free-limbed, with flashing eyes, and antique 
water- vases on their heads, move past him from the low- 
rimmed shadowy wells. And he sees them there and smiles. 
He sees on the beach by the sea the summer idler sitting 
beneath the jutting rock, gazing far out upon the sea, yet 
ignoring the white sails that pass up and down before him, as 




BY THE SEA. 



well as the open volume upon his knee, while his thoughts 
float outward and upward with the graceful wreaths of smoke 
that encircle his head ; and if of a practical turn, he listlessly 
wonders why, if his own delightful land furnishes some 



278 AMERICAN SMOKERS. 

twentieth of the whole Tobacco produce of the world, and does 
honor to her native weed by being its mightiest consumer, 
why, in the name of all disasters, the product is so dear — ay, 
doubly dear ? And thus as his pipe burns low, a hundred 
other statistics ; then, knocking out his whitened ashes on 
the floor, he reads sedately (his pipe being out) that the " To- 
bacco plant furnishes ashes to the amount of one-fourth of 
its bulk, being a much greater proportion than that of any 
other vegetable product," and, moreover, that " Tobacco ex- 
hausts the soil at the ratio of fourteen tons of wheat to one 
of Tobacco !" Oh, base insinuation ! But, as he relights his 
pipe, and the graceful vapor circles in fresh buoyancy and 
grace before him, he only, in his contented mind, retains that 
one supreme expression — " One ton of Tobacco /" Ah, 

" Think of it, picture it 
Now, if you can !" 

From " A Paper of Tobacco," *we extract the following 
humorous description of Yankee cigar smokers, which to a 
certain extent is true to life, but like most of the articles 
descriptive of American life by English Authors, who travel 
in America and write a hook afterwards, it is exaggerated or 
overdrawn : 

" The Americans, who pride themselves on being the fast- 
est-going people on the ' versal globe ' — who build steamers 
that can out-paddle the sea-serpent and breed horses that can 
trot faster than an ostrich can run — are, undoubtedly, enti- 
tled to take precedence of all nations as consumers of the 
weed. The sedentary Turk, who smokes from morn to night, 
does not, on an average, get through so much tobacco per 
annum, as a right slick, active, go-ahead Yankee, who thinks 
nothing, 'upon his own relation,' of felling a wagon-load of 
timber before breakfast, or of cutting down a couple of acres 
com before dinner. The Americans, it is to be observed, gen- 
erally smoke cigars ; and tobacco in this form burns very fast 
away in the open air, more especially when the consumer is 
rapidly locomotive, whether upon his own legs, the back of 
a horse, the top of a ooach, the deck of a steamboat, or in an 
open railway carriage. The habit of chewing tobacco is also 

* London, 18S9 



AT HOME. 



279 



prevalent in * the States,' nor is it, as in Great Britain and 
Ireland, almost entirely confined to the poorer classes. Mem- 
bers of the House of Representatives and of the Senate, doc- 




AN AMERICAN SMOKER. 



tors, judges, barristers, and attorneys chew tobacco almost as 
generally as the laboring classes in the old country. Even in 
a court of justice, more especially in the Western States, it is 
no unusual thing to see judge, jury, and the gentlemen of the 
bar, all chewing and spitting as liberally a's the crew of a 
homeward-bound West Indiaman. It must indeed be con- 
fessed that Brother Jonathan loves tobacco ' not wisely but 
too well,' and that the habits which are induced by his man- 
ner of using it are far from ' elegant.' The truth is, he neither 
smokes nor chews like a gentleman ; he lives in a land of 
liberty, and takes his tobacco when and where he pleases. 
He spits as freely as he smokes and chews — upon the carpet 
or in the fire-place — for he is not particular as to where he 
squirts his copious saliva, and does not think with the late 
Dr. Samuel Parr, that a spitting-box is a necessary article of 
household furniture. The free-born citizen of the States 
laughs at the aristocratic restrictions imposed on smoking in 
England, where, on board of the numerous steamboats that 



280 SENTIMENT. 

ply on the Thames, conveying the pride of the city to Grave- 
send and Margate, no smoking is allowed abaft the funnel, 
and where, in public-houses ashore, no gentleman is permitted 
to smoke in the parlor before two o'clock in the afternoon, 
A pipe of tobacco, or a cigar, after a day's hard exercise, 
■whether mental or bodily, and after the cravings of hunger 
and thirst are appeased, may be fairly ranked amongst the 
most delightful and most harmless of all earthly luxuries. It 
fills the mind with pleasing visions, and the heart with kindly 
feelings. A hard-working laborer, smoking by the side of 
his hearth at night, presents a perfect picture of quiet enjoy- 
ment. I see him now in my mind's eye. He is seated in an 
old high-backed, cushionless arm-chair, but an easy one, nev- 
ertheless, to him, who from dawn till sunset, has been en- 
gaged in ploughing, thrashing, ditching, or mowing. With 
one leg thrown over the other, he quietly reclines backward, 
and with an expression of perfect mental composure, he gazes 
on the smoke that ascends from his pipe. There is a senti- 
ment-exciting power* in the smoke of tobacco when perceived 
by the eye, as well as a pleasing sedative effect when inhaled ; 
and those smokers who have any doubt of the fact should 
take a pipe with their eyes closed. A person who smokes 
with his eyes shut cannot very well tell whether his cigar is 
lighted or not. How soothing is a pipe or a cigar to a wearied 
sportsman, on his return to his inn from the moors ! As he 
Bits quietly smoking, he thinks of the absent friends whom 
he will gratify with presents of grouse ; and, in a state of per- 
fect contentment with himself and all the world, he deter- 
mines to give all his game away. Full of such kindly feel- 
ings, he retires to bed ; but, alas, with day-light, when the 
effect of the tobacco has subsided, the old leaven of selfishness 
prevails, and his good intentions are abandoned. ' Mary,* 
said an old Cumberland farmer to his daughter, when she 
was once asking him to buy her a new beaver, ' why dost 
thou always tease me about such things when I'm quietly 
smoking my pipe ?' ' Because ye are always best-tempered 
then, feyther,' was the reply. ' I believe, lass, thou's reet,' 
rejoined the farmer ; ' for when I was a lad, I remember that 
my poor feyther was just the same ; after he had smoked a 
pipe or twee he wad ha' gi'en his head away if it had been 
loose.' " 



•The smoke aicendlng from the snnff of a candle conld excite a sentimental feelingr la 
the minds of Wordsworth and Sir George Beaumont, though It teems to hate bad no such 
effect on the mind of Crabbe.— iociAart'a Life of Sir Walter Scott. 



ODE TO A CIGAR. 281 

The following ode to a Cigar is no doubt familiar to many, 
yet will pay a re-perusal : 

" And oft, mild friend, to me thou art 
A monitor, though still ; 
, Thou speak'st a lesson to my heart 

Beyond the preacher's skill. 

" Thou'rt like the man of worth, who gives 
To goodness every day, 
The odor of whose virtues lives 
When he has passed away. 

" When in the lonely evening hour^ 
Attended but by thee, 
O'er history's varied page I pore, 
Man's fate in thine I see. 

" Oft, as thy snowy column growa, 
Then breaks and falls away, 
I trace how mighty realms thus rose, 
Thus trembled to decay. 

" Awhile, like thee, earth's masters burn, 
And smoke and fume around, 
And then like thee to ashes turn. 
And mingle with the ground. 

" Life's but a leaf adroitly rolled, 
And time's the wasting breath, 
That, late or early, we behold 
Gives all to dusty death. 

" From beggar's frieze to monarch's robe 
One common doom is passed ; 
Sweet nature's work, the swelling globe, 
Must all burn out at last. 

" And what is he who smokes thee now ? 
A little moving heap. 
That soon, like thee, to fate must bow, 
With thee in dust must sleep. 

j "But though thy ashes downward go, 
j ; Thy essence rolls on high ; 
t! Thus, when my body must lie low, 
• My soul shall cleave the sky." 

In Charles Butler's " Story of Count Bismarck's Life," a 
good anecdote is told of the Count and his last cigar : — 



282 



CIGAR LIGHTERS. 



" ' The value of a good cigar,' said Bismarck, as he pro- 
ceeded to light an excellent Havana, 'is best understood 
when it is the last you possess, and there is no chance of get- 
ting another. At Koniggratz I had only one cigar left in 
my pocket, which I carefully guarded during the whole of 
the battle as a miser does his treasure. I did not feel justi- 
fied in using it. I painted in glowing colors in my mind the 
happy hour when I should enjoy it after the victory. But I 
had miscalculated my chances.' ' And what was the cause of 
your miscalculation V 'A poor dragoon. He lay helpless, 
with both arms crushed, murmuring for something to refresh 
him. I felt in my pockets and found I had only gold, and 
that would be of no use to him. But, stay, I had still my 
treasured cigar ! I lighted this for him, and placed it be- 
tween his teeth. You should have seen the poor fellow's 
grateful smile ! 1 never enjoyed a cigar so much as that one 
which I did not smoke.' " 

In European cities juveniles offer the smoker, at every 
street corner, a "pipe" or a " cigar light." The following 
description, entitled " Light, Sir," is from an English journal, 

and contains much in- 
teresting information 
on the various modes 
of lighting pipes and 
cigars. 

""Ere y'are, sir — 
pipe- light, cigar-light, 
on'y 'ap'ny a box — 
'ave a light, sir.' Ev- 
ery smoker of the 
larger cities knows 
the cry. Every ten- 
der-hearted smoker is 
familiar with the ap- 
peal, by day and by 
night, and remembers 
pangs of regret he has 
felt when the want 
of ha' pence or the re- 
pletion oi his match-box has prevented his much-besought 
response. There is no need now to enlarge upon the suffer- 
ings, the adventures, the dangers of these peripatetic juvenile 
trades folk, sparse of clothes and food, and full of the 




LIGHT, SIR, 



SMOKING AN ART. *^ 283 

material which may make or mar a nation ; for all this wag 
done, and even overdone, by the graphic sensationalists of 
the London penny dailies when Chancellor Lowe proposed 
a tax on matches. We may, upon occasion, feel for the 
manufacturers and venders of 'lights,' but more generally 
we find ourselves constrained to sympathize with the pur- 
chasers of such contrivances for the ignition of pipes and 
cigars. The smoking of tobacco is an art ; an art which, in 
its proper exercise, requires much care, much prudence, and 
not a little skill. This is a proposition which must, from its 
very nature, be startling to non-smokers, and surprising to 
many smokers. The tobacco hater (invariably an illogical 
creature, who hates that which he knows not) will hold up 
hands in amazement, and snifE with the nose in contempt, to 
whom reply would be superfluous. 

"With the smoker the case is otherwise. A German 
writer recently said that the English were better smokers 
than the Germans; because, whereas the German smoked 
incessantly, without rule, system, or moderation, the English 
smoked with care, with slow and appreciative lovingness, and 
the determination not to overstep the bounds of rational enjoy- 
ment. Had he known more of English smokers, he would 
not have made so wild a statement ; and had he known Eng- 
lish women better, he would never have attributed to their 
Bweet influence the fancied superiority he describes in Eng- 
lish as compared with German smoking. In truth, the art 
of tobacco using is nowhere more ignored, nowhere more 
contemptuously neglected than in these ' favored isles.' For 
one man who smokes with a reason, for a purpose, or by 
system, you shall find a thousand who smoke without either ; 
and the result is that those who smoke have little defense, in 
the general way, for their practice, while those who condemn 
the habit have far better grounds for their opposition than 
they have ever yet been able to explain. To those who do 
know why they use tobacco, it is well-nigh incredible that so 
many of their fellow-smokers should be ignorant of the 
properties, the uses, the abuses, of the weed they burn and 
the fumes in which they delight. Yet, even this is not so 
surprising as the fact that so few of those who smoke — 
smoke much, often and constantly — should be ignorant of, 
or indifferent to, the conditions which are necessary to their 
own adequate enjoyment of the weed. 

" You will see a man light a cigar so carelessly that one 
side of the roll will burn rapidly, with prodigious fumigation 



284 SCIENCE OP LIGHTING. 

and giving out a dark and offensive cloud, while tlie other 
side remains untouched by the fire, only to wither and crackle 
and twist into uncouth shapes, until the smoker flings the 
cigar away, with an accompaniment of expletives which 
attach rather to his own stupidity than to the piece of to- 
bacco he has so abominably abused. You will see another 
with a good pipe, laden with good tobacco, well lit, blowing 
incessantly down the mouth-piece and the stem until the 
moisture introduced with his breath into the bowl of his 
pipe effectually prevents the tobacco from burning, and puts 
out the fire ; and then you will hear him lament that he 
should have paid so good a price for a pipe so bad that it 

* fouls' before he has smoked a single hour. You will see 
another who, while he talks to his friends, allows his tobacco 
to go out every three or four minutes, so that at length his 
mouth is sore and his palate nauseated with the combined 
fumes of lucifer matches, burnt paper and exhausted tobacco 
dust ; and he inveighs against the ' cabbage-leaf which that 
rascally tobacconist sold him for good Shag or Cavendish.' 
Another knows so little of the art of smoking that he never 

* stops ' his pipe, and so allows the light dust of the burnt 
weed to fly about him in flakes and minute particles, to the 
permanent damage of his own and his neighbors' clothes. 
But in nothing is the inartistic character of English smoking 
so conspicuously exemplified as in the use of ' lights.' Tliose 
who form the great majority of smokers amongst the Eng- 
lish-speaking races seem to consider that, so long as their 
pipes are set alight, it matters not how or from what source 
the light is obtained. Thus, one will place his pipe-bowl in 
a flame of gas, and pull away at the stem till his tobacco ia 
on flre ; another will thrust the bowl into the midst of a coal 
fire, and when he sees a glow in the bowl withdraw it, and 
contentedly puff away ; another stops an obliging policeman 
or railway guard, and ignites his tobacco by hard pulling at 
the flame of an oil-lamp ; another will stick the end of a 
choice cigar into the bowl of a pipe filled with coarsest Shag, 
thus ruining the flavor of his 'prime Havana' forever; while 
yet another will light lucifer matches, and apply the blazing 
brimstone to his pipe or cigar, thus saturating the whole 
mass with sulphurous and phosphorctic fumes, to the ruin of 
the weed and the injury of his own health. 

" How much wiser the West Indian negro, who takes a 
burning stick from the wood tire, and tenderly lights his 
weed therewith, or joyfully brings a handful of the white-hot 



AGE OF FUSEES. 



285 



ashes in his thick-skinned palm, that * massa ' may fire his 
cigar ! Or the travelling peddler or tinker, who, as he sits 
by the way-side, patiently wooes the sun with a * burning- 
glass ' till his tobacco ignites, or uses with equal prudence 
and skill the ancient but inimitable tinder-box. 

"But this is the age of Fusees. What a name! "When, 
in our youth, those longitudinal strips of tinder, semi-divided 




BRINGING A LIGHT. 



into innumerable transverse slips, all tipped with harmless, 
ignitable matter, first assumed the title, we had little notion 
of the atrocities which would come to be dignified by their 
name. This was soon after the world had been delighted by 
the Congreves, which drove Lucifer to the wall, and before 
English and German ingenuity had taught us to find 'death' 
in the box, as well as 'the pot.' The innocent old fusee had 
his faults, certainly. He would not always light ; he had a 
bad habit of turning back on your finger-nail and burning its 
quick when you struck him ; and he would occasionally light 
up, all by himself, and set fire to fifty of his fellows in your 
waist-coast pocket, or the tail of your best dress-coat. (Those 
were the days when waist-coats were gorgeous and tail-coats 
immense.) But what were these peccadilloes compared with 
the sins of the modern ' cigar-light ? ' * Fusees,' forsooth ! 
More like bomb-shells, military mines, torpedoes, and nitro- 
glycerine trains. Who has not had them explode in his eye. 



286 FLAMERS. 

on liis cheek, down his neck, scarring his skin, burning holes 
in his coats and trousers, frightening passers-by, and doing 
all manner of deep-dyed devilment ? Nor is this the worst. 
Those who will trust their skins, and their eyes, and their 
clothes to ' Vesuvians,' ' Flamers,' and the like, are not to be 
pitied ; for they are more cruel to their tobacco than the 
fusees are to them. Our grievance is that so many engines 
of destructiveness and otfensiveness should be so largely 
patronized by smokers, to their own discomfort, the ruination 
of their tobacco, the scandalization of gentle and simple, and 
the encouragement of vicious manufactures. Now, we are 
not going to particularize too closely, for fear of conse- 
quences. In these days, when a man may bring an action 
for libel because it has been said of him that he sells bad 
Boup at a railway station, prudence is the better part of valor. 
But, just examine this heterogeneous pile of 'cigar-lights,' 
whicli rears its audacious head upon the table. Here are 
Palmers, Barbers, Farmers, Lord Lornes, Tichbornes, Bry- 
ants and Moys, Bells and Blacks, Alexandres, Bismarcks, 
King Williams, Napoleons, and scores of other varieties. 
Some light 'only on the box,' some light anywhere, some 
everywhere, and some nowhere. Some are on wood, some 
on porcelain, some on glass, some on dire deeds intent. 
There are vestas, safety-matches, patent flint-and-steel con- 
trivances, with silver tubes and marvellous screws wherewith 
to put them out when they have served your turn. Some 
are excellent, many passable, still more intolerable. One of 
these times it may be worth while to speak of the good ones, 
but at present we care only to treat of those that are bad, 
and that briefly. 

"Here's a 'Flamer' — we name no names — everybody 
seems to make flamers; and this one deserves his title. We 
want to light a peaceful pipe, and he bursts out in a fury 
like unto nothing on earth so much as Etna in convulsion, 
or the Tuilleries in petroleum blaze. But, if you have any 
respect for your tobacco, your lips, your nostrils, or your 
lungs, you will let him get rid of liis flames before you apply 
him to your cigar ; and, when you do venture so far, he 
drops off the stick and burns a hole in the carpet. Or, if 
you be daring enough to take a light from the flamer while 
he flames, you spoil your tobacco, foul your mouth, and get 
a taste of sulphur-suffocation such as Asmodeus might have 
were he to take a whiff of a smoke-and-tire belching chimney 
in the Black Country as he flies across that district by night. 



"HOME-MADE CIGARS." 287 

Haven't got a light ? Glad of it. Try a Vesuvian-round, 
black and tipped with blue. There's a pyrotechnic display 
for you ! Now, in with it, after the approved style illus- 
trated by the two human hands engaged in lighting a cigar 
on the illuminated cover of the box. ' Ugh !' you say. Just 
so ; you've got a mouthful of choice abominations, which will 
cost you much waste of saliva, several shivers, and the whole 
piece of tobacco yon were about to enjoy. Here, put that 
away ; take another, light it quietly with this Avax-vesta, or 
this wooden ' spill,' or this screw of paper ; smoke gently, 
don't let the fire out, and you'll be all right. In future, you 
may be wise enough to avoid cheap cigar-lights and pipe- 
lights, even for use in the streets. Our word upon it — they 
are far dearer than those which cost more." 

The following description of " Home Made Cigars " is 
from All the Year Round, and will doubtless be read with 
interest by many growers of the weed who may recall sim- 
ilar scenes : 

" ' Apropos of cigars,' said Wilkins, lighting a second fra- 
grant Havana with the stump of the first, ' let's go and see the 
farmer's establishment for making them. You see that field 
of tobacco over yonder ? Old Standish raises his own weed, 
dries it in the big open sheds behind the barn, cures it — I 
don't quite know the whole process — and then has it made 
into sixes and short fives, Conchas and Cabanas, like a 
Cuban senor. I went over the establishment about a year 
ago, and it is worth seeing.' 

" We strolled first over to the tobacco field. The weed was 
then just at its full ripeness, and the long, flappy, delicately- 
furred green leaves bent gracefully over toward the ground, 
growing smaller and smaller the higher they were on the 
stout stalk. Few foreigners know that even as far north as 
New England, in the sunny valleys of Connecticut, sheltered 
as they are from the bleak east winds of the Atlantic 
and accustomed to a long and steady summer heat, to- 
bacco is grown in large quantities, flourishes exuberantly, 
and is one of the chief sources of profit to the farmers. It 
needs a rich warm soil and careful tending ; but it gives in 
its growth, a sentimental reward to the cultivator ; for it 
comes up gracefully, rapidly, and beautifully, and is with 
some care, one of the most satisfactory crops to ' handle." 
Having gaz-ed at and tasted the thick leaves, we sauntered 
behind the barn, and there saw the long open shed, with 



288 



FEMALE CIGAR-MAKERS. 



beams running parallel from end to end, where the gathered 
tobacco leaves were hung to be thoroughly dried by the sun. 
" Then Wilkins conducted us for some distance along the 
river bank ; we jumped into a boat and rowed perhaps half 
a mile, landing by the side of a little shop-like building, 
where we heard the hum of voices and the commotion of 
many busy persons. We entered and found ourselves in a 
long, low room, having wide tables ranged along the 
•walls ; here, working rapidly, were rows of chatty country 




MAKING CIGARS. 



girls, who, as they worked, laughed and talked, and now 
and then hummed a verse of some familiar ballad. 
Neatly packed piles of the dried and cured leaf lay upon 
the table before them. 

" Each was armed with knives and cutters, and we watched 
the quick transformation of the flat leaves into the smooth 
and compact cigars. The tobacco grown upon the farm was, 
we discovered, only used as wrappers for the cigars. The 
good farmer imported, for the interior filling, a fine tobacco 
from Havana. Strips and little pieces of this the girls 
placed in the centre of the cigar, wrapping the Connecticut 
tobacco in wide strips tightly about it, then pasting each of 
the last with some paste in a pot by their side. It seemed to 
be done almost in an instant ; the Havana slips were laid 



A SPICY ARTICLE. 289 

down, cut and trimmed, and pressed into shape in a twink- 
ling; the wrappers were cut as quickly; and, more rapidly 
than I can describe it, the cigar was made. These girls 
were mostly daughters of neighboring farmers, who received 
so much per hundred cigars made ; intelligent, bright-eyed 
and witty ; many of theui comely, with rosy cheeks and 
ruddy health; educated at the common schools, and able, 
their day's work over, to sit down at the piano and rattle 
away ad injinituTn. 

" His stock of cigars thus made up, from the first f owing 
to the last finishing touch, the good squire (being Yankee- 
like, a sort of Jack -of -all-trades,) would have them put up in 
gorgeously labeled boxes, carry them to town, and sell them 
to retail dealers ; not disdaining himself, twice or thrice a 
year, to go through the neighboring States with samples, 
and acting as his own commercial traveler." 

This description, however, may not convey a correct idea 
of the exact mode of manufacture to many growers of to- 
bacco in the Connecticut Yalley inasmuch as many planters 
of the " weed " make the entire cigar (more particularly for 
their own use) wrapper, binder and filler wholly of seed- 
leaf tobacco, such cigars do not readily sell to the trade 
except at inferior prices which admit cf but a small profit to 
the manufacturer. The following spicy article from the 
"London Figaro " may be interesting to all smokers as well 
as guide them in the selection of a good cigar. 

"I am an imaginative person, and 'society' has treated 
me shamefully of late — its tangible delights are absent from 
me. Allow me, then, to console myself by the ' creations of 
smoke,' as Lord Lytton puts it. I am scouted by society, 
because I am in love. I am told I look : 

"As hyenas in love are supposed to look, or 
A something between Abelaid and old Bliicher." 

And, moreover, I am an ugly man, but there was 
only a fortnight's difierence in gaining a woman's love 
between John Wilkes and the handsomest man in Eng- 
land, courage, Jehu ! I like idleness, because it shows 
that one can afford it ; so I am pufiing idly — ah ! the balmy 
fragrance of this mild Havana ! 'Oh ! the effect of that first 
note from the woman one loves !' says one ; ' Oh ! the kiss 
on the dimpled cheek, the sound of the silver voice !' says 
19 



290 HOW TO SMOKE. 

another; but what can compare to the dreamy exquisite 
luxury of a good cigar ? But, heavens, what am I saying ? I 
am in love, and Julia reads the " Figaro !" The paleness of 
Flaxman's illustrations spreads over me — please, reader, look 
upon the sentiment as sarcastic. I am in a fog of smoke, 
and am quaffing claret from the silvered pewter. There's 
plenty of it ; and no soul can say : 

"That in drinking from that beaker 
I am sipping like a fly.' 

How changed from the long, long days ago, when I was a 
connoisseur in Parparillo cigars, brown-paper cigarettes, and 
cane cheroots ! Then I fondly adored Sir Walter Raleigh 
as my earthly idol, for giving me tobacco — when I had the 
halfpence to buy it — and delighted in the story, told by 
queer Oldys, of Sir Walter's servant extinguishing the Vir- 
ginny smoke that issued from his master's lips, by drenching 
him with ale. Alas ! my idol is shattered by Hawkins. The 
Spaniards say, ' The lie that lasts for half an hour is worth 
telling.' History has lied for longer, by a considerable period. 
Fond even as I was of my brown-papered cigarettes when 
baccy failed, I must confess I never reached the stage attained 
by Sir Christopher Haydon's chaplain, William Breedon, 
parson of Thornton, in Bucks, who was so given to 

" October store and best Virginia," 

that when he had no tobacco (and too much drink) he used 
to cut the hell-Topes and smoke them ! 

" The Polyglot — three parts — my text ; 
Howbeit — likewise — now to my next." 

" On Smoke. — It is a vulgar, ludicrous, and foolish custom 
to bite off the nose of a cigar. Don't be a Vandal — you are 
not a Sandwich Islander, about to chew your Kava. A cigar 
should be handled daintily ; it is a fragile, graceful creature 
— don't mar its beauty. Tear off the twist, and the pleasure 
of smoking is at an end ! The outer leaf bncomes untwirled. 
Ere it is half finished, you have a ragged end between your 
lips — nasty, foul, and unsightly — through which the smoke 
comes in huge clouds to your month, instead of slender 
streams on the palate. ' How, then,' say you ; ' prick it, or 
cut it, or what?' Tear it not, cut it not ; nor yet puncture 
it. Don't be frightened of the cigar — thrusting a half-inch 
alone into the mouth ; but, when you begin, take a good 
half of it in the mouth ; pull at it lustily for a few seconds, 



DRINKING AND SMOKING. 



291 



to open its pores ; then draw it out, allowing but an inch to 
be held within the lips— believe me, you will enjoy it a hun- 
dred-fold more ; and there are but few cigars that will not 
allow of their virtue being drawn though their leaves. Never 
bite the end off, and never use your cigar cruelly, by squeez- 
ing it, biting it, or re-lighting it. Cigar-holders, tubes, quills, 
and such hke inventions, we despise. If you cannot bear the 
cigar in your mouth— aye, and enjoy it— you have no busi- 
ness with It : go back to your brown paper and cane ! 

"What is the best beverage to imbibe whilst inhaling the 
precious weed? Momentous question! Coffee, or claret 
says Jehu. I do not believe in bitter, as an accom- 
panying liquid to a cigar. The Corporation of Christ-church, 
years ago, smoked cigars, and drank with them that then 
famous concoction known as * Kingwood Beer.' What was 
the result ? The first toast at every civic banquet held for 
years in that borough was gravely given out, and bumpered 
with due solemnity, as follows : — 

' Prosperation to this Corporation.' 

Brandy is a perfect antidote to inebriation from beer, so we 
are told. The Corporation should have known this, and 
been awakened from their long and pleasant dream of pros- 
peration. Brandy I should hardly reckon amongst the drinks 
that ought to be with cigars, notwithstanding that Tennyson 
has asked : — o ^ 

•For what delights can equal those 
Which stir, with spirits, inner depths ? &c.' 

Brandy-and-water, gin, whisky, and the likes are only fit for 
those who nocturnally lay the foundation for matutinal ' hot 
coppers,' with the vilest shag in the most odorous of yards 
of clay. ' Smoking leads to drinking,' has been a favorite 
old woman's saying for time out of mind. How I hate old 
women's sayings ! A grain— requiring to be picked out with 
a pm and microscope— of truth, with a bushel of bunkum or 
cant. How is it, that ever since the days of James I, of 
'hateful to the nose, harmful to the brain ' memory, there 
have always been carpers on the injurious effects of smok- 
ing ? ' Nicotine !' they say, with a would-be-taken-for-know- 
all-about-it-air. Quite so ; but, as recent investigations have 
proved that, so far as the actual ' poisoning ' is concerned, it 
would take upwards of a thousand years to kill the most 
inveterate of healthy smokers, we have still time to breathe— 
and ' It please the pigs.' Mem. for pipers— French tobacco 



292 SMOKING CHRISTIANS. 

contains the greatest, Turkish the least, per-centage of nico- 
tine. Havana, two and one-half per cent. 

" But an unique old wouian of Jehu's acquaintance goes 
further still ; boldly asserting that ' smoking is well for mak- 
ing good soldiers, well for making good sailors, well for 
making sometimes good lawyers ; not so well for making 
good Christians.' Oh ! ashes of Hawkins and Raleigh, shud- 
der for the results of ' baccy on degraded human nature.' 
There must be a rarity of good Christians, then amongst the 
parsons ; they are nil fond of it. Dean Aldrich was, per- 
haps, the greatest smoker of his day. His excessive attach- 
ment to this liabit was the cause of many wagers. Here's 
one : — At breakfast, one morning, at the ' Yarsity, an under- 
graduate laid his companion long odds that the Dean was 
smoking at that instant. Away they hastened ; and, being 
admitted to the Dean's study, stated the occasion of their 
visit. The Dean replied, in perfect good humor, to the layer 
of the bet, 'You see, sir, you have lost your wager; for I 
am not smoking, but filling my pipe.' But — my cigar has 
reached its last dying speech, and there is but a drop left in 
the beaker. 

' I'll not leave thee, thou lone drop ! 
'Twould be mighty unkind, 
Since the rest I have swallow'd, 
To leave thee behind.' 

" Final exhortation. Choose the small, sound, tolerably 
firm, and elastic cigar : the dwarf contains stuff within which 
the giant hath not. Don't flatter yourself you're smoking 
cabbage, if not tobacco — its any odds on rhubarb ! 

' For me there's nothing new or rare, 

Till vi'ine deceives my brain ; 
And that, I think, 's a reason fair 
To fill my pipe again.' " 

Charles Lamb, " the gentle Elia " was during a portion of 
his lifetime a famous smoker. In a letter to Hazlitt he 
writes, " I am so smoky with last night's ten pipes, that I 
must leave off." It is said that he smoked only the coarsest 
and strongest he could procure. Dr. Parr inquired of him 
how he acquired his "prodigious smoking powers." "I 
toiled after it, sir," was the reply, " as some men toil after 
virtue !" Lamb was constant in his use of tobacco, and 
among all the great luminaries of English literature we know 
of none more addicted to the use of the pipe. Lamb might 
often be seen in his chambers in Mitre Court Building, puff- 
ing the coarsest weed from a long clay pipe, in company with 



LAMB'S POEM. 293 

Parr who used tlie finest kind of tobacco in a pipe half filled 
with salt. It was no easy task to relinquish the use of tobacco 
and it cost him many a struggle and much determined efibrt. 
In writing to Wordsworth he says : — " I wish you may think 
this a handsome farewell to my * Friendly Traitress.' Tobacco 
has been my evening comfort and my morning curse for 
these five years. I have had it in my head to do it (Fare- 
well to Tobacco) these two years ; but tobacco stood in its 
own light when it gave me headaches that prevented my 
singing its praises." 

Lamb's poem is without doubt one of the finest pieces of 
verse ever written on tobacco, and seemingly contains both 
words of praise and dispraise — the latter however in some 
sense are insincere. 

" May the Babylonish curse 
Straight confound my stammering verse 
If I can a passage see 
In this word-perplexity, 
Or a fit expression find, 
Or a language to my mind, 
(Still the phrase is wide or scant,) 
To take leave of thee, GREAT PLANT! 
Or in my terms relate 
Half my love, or half my hate ; 
For I hate, yet love thee so, 
That whichever thing I shovr. 
The plain truth will seem to be 
A constrain'd hyperbole, 
And the passion to proceed 
More from a mistress than a weed. 
Sooty retainer to the vine, 
Bacchus' black servant, negro fine ; 
Sorcerer, thou mak'st us dote upon 
Thy begrimed complexion. 
And for thy pernicious sake. 
More and greater oaths to break 
Than reclaimed lovers take 
'Gainst women : thou thy siege do'st lay 
Much too in the female way, 
While thou suck'st the lab'ring breath 
Faster than kisses or than death. 
Thou in such a cloud do'st bind us, 
That our worst foes cannot find us. 
And ill fortune that would thwart us, 



294 



LAMB'S POEM. 

Shoots at rovers shooting at us ; 
While each man through thy height'ning steam 
Does like a smoking ^tna seem, 
And all about us does express 
(Fancy and wit in richest dress) 
A Sicilian fruitfulness. 
Thou though such a mist dost show U3 
That our best friends do not know us, 
And for those allowed features 
Due to reasonable creatures, 
Liken'st us to feel Chimeras 
Monsters that, who see us, fear us ; 
Worse than Cerberus or Geryon, 
Or, who first loved a cloud, Ixion. 
Bacchus we know, and we allow. 
His tipsy rites, but what art thou, 
That but by reflex canst show 
What his deity can do. 
As the false Egyptian spell 
Aped the true Hebrew miracle? 
Some few vapors thou may'st raise, 
The weak brain may serve to amaze, 
But to the reins and nobler heart 

Canst nor life nor heat impart. 

Brother of Bacchus, later born. 

The old world was sure forlorn. 

Wanting thee, that aidest more. 

The gods' victories than before 

All his panthers, and the brawls, 

Of his piping Bacchanals. 

These, as stole, we disallow 

Or judge of thee meant : only thou 

His true Indian conquest art ; 

And, for ivy round his dart. 

The reformed god now weaves 

A finer thyrsus of thy leaves. 

Scent to match thy rich perfume— 

Chemic art did ne'er presume, 

Through her quaint alembic strain, 

None so sov'reign to the brain. 

Nature, that did in thee excel, 

Framed again no second smell. 

Roses, Violets but toys 

For the smaller sort of boys ; 
Or for greener damsels meant ; 
Thou art the only manly scent. 



LAMB'S POEM. £95 



Stinking'st of the stinking kind, 
Filth of the mouth and fog of the mind, 
Africa, that brags her fois on 
Breeds no such prodigious poison. 
Henbane, nightshade, both together, 

Hemlock, aconite 

Nay, rather. 
Plant divine of rarest virtue: 
Blisters on the tongue would hurt you. 
'Twas but in a sort I blamed thee; 
None e'er prospered who defamed thee; 
Irony all, and feigned abuse. 
Such as perplex'd lovers use. 
At a need, when in despair. 
To paint forth their fairest fair. 
Or in part but to express 
That exceeding comeliness 
Which their fancies doth so strike, 
They borrow language of dislike ; 
And instead of Dearest Miss, ' 

Jewel, Honey, Sweetheart, Bliss, 
And those forms of old admiring, 
Call her Cockatrice and Siren, 
Basilisk, and all that's evil, 
Witch, Hyena, Mermaid, devil, 
Ethiop, Wench, and Blackamoor, 
Monkey, Ape, and twenty more ; 
Friendly traitress, loving foe, 
Not that she is truly so. 
But no other may they know, 
A contentment to express. 
Borders so upon excess. 
That they do not rightly wot. 
Whether it be pain or not ; 
Or, as men constrained to part 
With what's nearest to their heart, 
While their sorrow's at the height 
Lose discrimination quite, 
And their hasty wrath let fall, 
To oppose their frantic gall, 
On the darling thing whatever 
Whence they feel it death to sever. 
Though it be, as they, perforce. 
Guiltless of the sad divorce. 
For I must (nor let it grieve thee, 
Friendliest of plants. 



.296 TOBACCO COMPLIMENT. 

That I must) leave thee. 
For thy sake, TOBACCO, I 
Would do anything but die, 
And but seek to extend my days 
Long enough to sing thy praise. 
But as she who once hath been, 
A king's consort, is a queen 
Ever after, nor will bate 
Any title of her state. 
Though a widow, or divorced, 
So I, from thy converse forced, 
The old name and style retain, 
A right Katherine of Spain, 
And a seat, too, 'mongst the joya 
Of the blest Tobacco Boys ; 
Where, though I, by sour physician. 
Am debarred the full fruition 
Of thy favors, I may catch, 
Some collateral sweets, and snatch. 
Sidelong odors, that give life 
Like glances from a neighbor's wife ; 
And still live in the by-places. 
And the suburbs of thy graces ; 
And in thy borders take delight. 
An unconquered Canaanite." 

Thomas Jones, in the following neat little tribute to to- 
bacco, pays a deserved compliment, not only to the plant, 
but to the great English smoker, " ye renowned Sir Walter 
Ealeigh." 

" Let poets rhyme of what they will. 
Youth, Beauty, Love or Glory, still 

My theme shall be Tobacco ! 
Hail, weed, eclipsing every flow'r, 
Of thee I fain would make my bow'r 
When fortune frowns, or tempests low'r. 
Mild comforter of woe ! 

" They say in truth an angel's foot 
First brought to life thy precious root, 

The source of every pleasure ! 
Descending from the skies he press'd 
With hallow'd touch Earth's yielding breast, 
Forth sprang the plant, and then was bless'd. 

As man's chief treasure ! 



CIGARETTE SMOKING. 297 

" Throughout the world who knows thee not ? 
Of palace and of lowly cot 

The universal guest ; 
The friend of Gentile, Turk and Jew, 
To all a stay — to none untrue, 
The balm that can our ills subdue, 

And soothe us into rest. 

" With thee the poor man can abide 
Oppression, want, the scorn of pride, 

The curse of penury, 
Companion of his lonely state, 
He is no longer desolate, 
And still can brave an adverse fate, 

With honest worth and thee ! 

" All honor to the patriot bold, 

Who brought instead of promised gold. 

Thy leaf to Britain's shore; 
It cost him life; but thou shall raise 
A cloud of fragrance to his praise. 
And bards shall hail in deathless lays 

The valiant knight of yore. 

*' Ay, Raleigh ! thou wilt live till Time 
Shall ring his last oblivious chime. 

The fruitful theme of story ; 
And man in ages hence shall tell. 
How greatness, virtue, wisdom fell. 
When England sounded out thy knell. 

And dimmed her ancient glory. 

" And thou, Plant ! shall keep his name 
Unwither'd in the scroll of fame. 

And teach us to remember ; 
He gave with thee content and peace, 
Bestow'd on life a longer lease. 
And bidding ev'ry trouble cease. 

Made Summer of December !" 

The smoker of cigarettes is passionately attached to his 
"little roll" and regards this mode of obtaining the flavor of 
tobacco the best. The finest are made in Havana and, vast 
quantities are used by the Cubans and Spaniards. A writer 
in " The Tobacco Plant " gives this pleasing effusion in regard 
to them : — 

" Your cigarette is a sort of hybrid — half -pipe and half- 
cigar; neither the one nor the other; neither the delight of 



298 BREVITY AND SWEETNESS. 

the epicure nor the solace of the true tobacco-lover. Far be 
it from us to deny, or even to question, its value, its utility, 
or its charm. We have smoked too many to dream of treat- 
ing them with scorn — cigarettes of Virginia shag, strong, 
pungent, luscious ; of light and fragrant Persian, innocuous 
and soothing; cigarettes rolled by ladies' dainty fingers, 
compressed by elegant French machines of silk and silver, 
cut, stamped, and gummed by prosy, matter-of-fact, and even 
vulgar Titanic engines in great tobacco-factories. But the 
thorough-paced smoker renders to his cigarette only a sec- 
ondary and diluted adoration : it is nice, it is delicate, it is 
pretty — a thing to be toyed with, to be fondled, even to burn 
one's fingers (or, perchance, one's lips) withal ; but by no 
means an object to call forth a passion. 

" But just as the world would be a tame and an insipid 
institution were all men's tastes alike, so the world of smok- 
ers would lose much of its romance were all the lovers of 
the weed of temperament too robust to love a cigarette. 
Brevity and sweetness are proverbially held to constitute 
claims upon the respect and admiration of the voluptuous, 
and to the cigarette these cannot be denied. There is some- 
thing touching in the self-abnegation of a tobaccoite who will 
devote five mortal minutes and the sweat of his refined intel- 
ligence, with the skill of his delicate fingers, to the prepara- 
tion of a tiny capsule of the weed, which burns itself to ashes 
in five minutes more. There is a butterfly -beauty about the 
cigarette to which the cigar and the pipe can lay no claim — a 
summer charm to stir the dreamy rapture of a poet, and to 
excite the Lotus-eating philosopher even to analogy. Just 
as the suns, and flowers, and balmy zephyrs of a century have 
gone to form the gauzy, multi-colored insect that flits across 
your path throughout a single summer's day, and then returns 
to dust and vapor, so the harvest of "West-Indian and East- 
Asian fields, the long voyage of the mariner, the merchant's 
hours of soil, the steam-power and manual labor of the fac- 
tory, the thoughtful calculations of the trader, the skill of the 
tissue-paper maker, all have gone, and more than these, to 
the creation of a fairy-cylinder of Tobacco, which glows, 
delights, expires, and meets its end in ten or fifteen fleeting 
minutes.'' 

Although the cigarette is not a favorite with us, still we 
admire its use as a sort of appendage to a good dinner, and 
as preparatory work for a " good smoke." The Spaniards 
have always been great lovers of their minute rolls, and with 



THOMAS HOOD'S " CIGAR.' 299 

them, no other method of burning tobacco appears so delicate 
or refined. Especially is this true among the ladies, who 
prefer "Seville cigarettes" to all others. Many smokers 
make their own cigarettes, sometimes using Havana tobacco, 
and sometimes making them of two or more kinds. An 
excellent cigar is made by using equal parts of Virginia and 
Perique tobacco, or equal parts of Havana and Perique. A 
fine flavored cigarette is also made from Yara and Havana 
tobacco, equal parts of each being used. Thos. Hood has 
signalized his attachment to cigar in the following pleasing 
little poem : — 

THE CIGAR. 

" Some sigh for this and that, 
My wishes don't go far ; 
The world may wag at will, 
So I have my cigar. 

" Some fret themselves to death 
With Whig and Tory jar ; 
I don't care which is in, 
So I have my cigar. 

" Sir John requests my vote, 
And so does Mr. Marr ; 
I don't care how it does. 
So I have my cigar. 

" Some want a German row, 
Some wish a Russian war; 
I care not. I'm at peace, 
So I have my cigar. 

" I never see the Post, 
I seldom read the Star ; 
The Globe I scarcely heed. 
So I have my cigar. 

"Honors have come to men 

My juniors at the Bar ; 
No matter — I can wait. 
So I have my cigar. 

" Ambition frets me not ; 
A cab or glory's car 
Are just the same to me, 
So I have my cigar. 



300 LORD BYRON'S OPINION. 

" I worship no vain gods, 

But serve the household Lar ; 
I'm sure to be at home, 
So I have my cigar. 

" I do not seek for fame, 
A General with a scar ; 
A private let me be. 
So I have my cigar. 

" To have my choice among 
The toys of life's bazar. 
The deuce may take them all. 
So I have my cigar. 

*' Some minds are often tost 
By tempests like a tar; 
I always seem in port. 
So I have my cigar. 

" The ardent flame of love 
My bosom cannot char, 1 
I smoke but do not burn, 
So I have my cigar. 

" They tell me Nancy Low 

Has married Mr. R. ; 

The jilt ! but I can live, 

So I have my cigar." 

Lord Byron, a "good smoker" as well as a great poet, has 
immortalized his love of the cigar in the following graceful 
lines : — 

"Sublime Tobacco ! which from east to west, 
Cheers the tars labors, and the Turkman's rest — 
Which on the Moslem's ottoman divides 
His hours, and rivals opium and his brides ; 
Magnificent in Stamboul, but less grand, 
Though not less loved in Wapping or the Strand; 
Divine in hookhas, glorious in n pipe, 
When tipped with amber, mellow, rich, and ripe, 
Like other charms, wooing the caress 
More dazzingly when dawning in full dress. 
Yet thy true lovers more admire by far 
Thy naked beauties — Give me a Cigar !" 



KINDS OF CIGARS. 



301 



Having given a general description of the cigar and its 
mode of manufacture, we come now to a more particular 
account of the various kinds known as the best and of world- 
wide reputation. Standing at the head of the various kinds 
of cigars, either of the Old or New World, are those known 
to all smokers as : 

HAVANA CIGAES. 

These are, by common consent, the finest in the world. 
They possess every quality desirable in a cigar, and seem- 
ingly to its greatest extent. Grown in the richest portion 
of the tropical world, the leaf has a rich, oily appearance, 
and, when made into cigars, possesses a flavor as rich as it is 
rare. Unlike most tobaccos suitable for cigars, every taste 
can be met in the Havana cigars, its many varieties of flavor 
and strength suiting it alike to both sexes, and to the making 
of the delicate cigarette or the largest Cabanas. These cigars 
are made up of all the various colors and parts of the leaf, 




and also of all sizes common to the trade. In shape they 
are usually round, though sometimes pressed (flat), and in 
color are (according to our description) light and dark brown, 
light and dark red, straw colored and dark straw colored, and 
some other shades or strengths. It is necessary to have all 
the various shades of color in order to meet the demand for ^ 
the various flavors desired. Without doubt a greater variety/ 
of flavors can be found among Havana cigars than in an^ 
other kind, owing to the many shades of color, which deter-\ 
mines the strength and flavor of the cigar. The Havana^ 



302 SELECTING CIGARS. 

cigar is made of a leaf tobacco well knowft for its good burn- 
ing qualities, when properly cured and sweated, — burning 
with a clear, steady light, leaving a fine white or pearl-colored 
ash, according to the color chosen. These cigars rarely 
" char " in burning ; certainly not, if made of good quality 
of tobacco and thoroughly sweat. If a full-flavored cigar is 
desired, choose the dark colors, and the lighter if a mild 
cigar is preferable. The lighter the color of the tobacco the 
lighter the ash and the milder the flavor of the cigar. Light- 
colored cigars usually burn freer and more evenly than dark 
ones. In selecting a cigar for its good burning qualities, 
choose those (if such are to be had) covered with white 
specks, or white rust ; such cigars burn well, as white rust is 
found only on well-ripened leaves. Select a flrm, well-made 
cigar — one that contains a good quantity of fillers — avoiding, 
however, in Havana cigars, one made too nicely, as it is some- 
times the case that superior external appearance is made to 
cover defects in the more important qualities. 

Such a selection will insure a cigar of good quality ; one 
that will hold fire and last the length of time appropriate to 
its size. A cigar should not be chosen simply because it is 
made well, and neither because its outside appearance 
(wrapper) is fine, both in color and quality of leaf ; rather 
depend upon the manufacture of the brand. Havana cigars 
have as many distinct flavors as there are colors of the leaf, 
ranging from very mild to very strong. 

The first great requisite of a cigar is its burning quality, 
and the second its flavor ; without the first the latter is of 
little value. A cigar made from leaf that does not burn 
freely will not possess any desirable flavor, but will char and 
emit rank-smelling smoke, without any desirable feature 
whatever. When both of these qualities are in a measure 
perfect the cigar will prove to be good. There are two 
varieties, at least, known as non-burning tobacco, of which 
we shall speak hereafter. The flavor and burning quality of 
a cigar always determine its character, and are found in per- 
fection in those made of fine even-colored leaf. Dark cigars 



YARA CIGARS. 



303 



have a thicker leaf or more bodj, and consequently are 
stronger than light-colored cigars. "When the cigar is made 
of fine, well-sweat tobacco, and contains the full quantity of 
fillers, the pellet of ashes will be firm and strong, and should 
possess the same color all through, if the filler, binder and 
wrapper are of the same shade of color. The finest-flavored 
cigars are those of a medium shade, between a light and a 
dark brown, — not so dark as to be of strong, rank taste, or 
so mild as to be deficient in a decided tobacco flavor, but 
simply possessing sufiicient strength to give character to the 
cigar. 

YARA CIGARS. 

This variety of cigars is made from tobacco grown on the 
Island of Cuba, bearing the same name as the cigars. They 
are highly esteemed by those who smoke only this kind, but 
are not liked by most smokers of Havana cigars. Most of 
them are exported to Europe, very few of them finding their 
way to this country. It is somewhat difficult to compare 
them with Havana cigars, as the flavor is essentially diflerent. 




YARA CIGARS. 



In comparison with other brands made upon the Island, the 
Yara holds an unimportant place, yet, in some parts of Cuba, 
it is preferred to any other kind. In London the Yara is a 
favorite with many old smokers, who use no others. Old 
emokers describe the Yara cigar as having a " sweet " flavor, 
but one unaccustomed to them, like Hazard and others, pro- 
nounce them bitter, and having a " peculiar saline taste." It 
can, doubtless, be said with truth concerning the Yara cigar, 



304 MANILLA CIGARS. 

that unlike other varieties, such as Havana, Manilla, Para- 
guayan, Swiss and Brazil, the taste for them is not natural, 
but, when once formed, becomes very decided. As a general 
rule smokers of Yara cigars think other kinds are deficient 
in flavor, and are wanting in quality, because they lack the 
peculiar flavor belonging only to Yara cigars. Be this as it 
may, we hardly think the Yara cigar suited to the cigarist's 
taste at the present time. Its aromatic flavor is not adapted 
to the general taste, and some little time is required to de- 
velop a decided love for it. We prefer the " Cubas," made 
from a good quality of leaf grown near Trinidad, Puerto- 
Principe, and other cities east of Havana. The peculiar 
flavor of Yara cigars is owing to the character of the soil, 
rather than to any artificial process employed in manufactur- 
ing. In moistening Havana leaf Catalan wine is used, and 
other flavoring extracts. This may (and does) change the 
condition and quality of the tobacco, but even with this 
treatment, the flavor of Yara tobacco would be unlike that 

of Havana leaf. 

/ 

MANILLA CIGAES. 

This well-known variety of cigars is manufactured from 
Manilla tobacco grown in Luzerne, one of the Phillippine 
Islands, which is known as superior leaf for cigar purposes, 
Manilla cigars have an extensive reputation, but principally 
in the East and in Europe. These cigars are made in various 




MANILLA CIGAR AND CHEROOT. 



forms and shapes, some of them are called cheroots (the term 
used in the East for cigars) and are principally known for their 
aromatic flavor, entirely distinct from that of Havana cigars. 



SWISS CIGARS. 305 

Some smokers tliink that tliey have the same effect as varie- 
ties of tobacco that have been moistened with the juice of 
the poppy, giving the cigar a flavor hke that of opium, and 
as a natural result, securing a light-colored ash. There are 
not as many colors of Manilla cigars as there are of Havana, 
and they are not as closely assorted. Some of them are a 
high-cinnamon color, and are far from being a strong cigar. 
Their flavor is not always uniform, and is not denoted by the 
color as in other varieties. Tlie flavor is not unpleasant, but 
is better suited to those who prefer a mild rather than a full 
flavored cigar. The aroma is pleasant and mild, and to those 
but little acquainted with them, agreeable. Manilla tobacco 
usually burns well, if the leaf is of 'good quality and well 
sweated, still it is known as a non-burning tobacco. As the 
tobacco is of good body, the cigars do not usually burn as 
well as other kinds. Select a light-colored rather than a 
dark cigar if one of good quality is desired. Both the cigars 
and cheroots are made of the same quality of leaf, and are of 
about the same size — differing, however, in shape. There 
are but few grades of Manilla cigars, and most of them are 
solid and well wrapped. They are flat rather than round, 
and draw well but do not hold fire like some other cigars. 
The leaf makes a very good wrapper for a tobacco of its 
thickness and strength. 

^ SWISS CIGAKS. 

These well-known cigars have but little reputation in this 
country, owing to the fact of their being but little known. 
In Europe the cigars of Luzerne have no insignificant repu- 
tation, and are generally liked by smokers who prefer a mild 
and agreeable cigar. These cigars are usually dark-colored, 
but not strong, and have but little variety of flavor. Travel- 
ers and tourists through Switzerland speak of Swiss cigars as 
being of agreeable flavor, and unlike any other found in 
Europe. With American tobacco, those of a dark color are 
usually strong, but with European tobaccos this is not always 
the case — they possess much less strength, and can be used 
20 



306 



PARAQUAT CIGARS. 



more freely than the tobacco of America. These cigars are 
usually pressed, and burn well, leaving a dark-colored ash, 
and emitting a fragrant odor. Most of those used in this 
country may be more properly termed cheroots, both ends 




SWISS CIGARS. 



being cut, allowing a free passage of air, which is usually the 
case with all kinds of cheroots, or Eastern and European 
cigars. There is not that freshness of flavor to Swiss cigars 
peculiar to Havana's, and they lack that essential quality 
which renders the latter so delicious and enjoyable. The 
Swiss cigar is in perfection when just made or rolled, and 
such should be chosen instead of those that have been made 
ior some time and closely packed and dried. 

PARAGUAY CIGARS. 

These cigars are made of one of the finest varieties of leaf 
tobacco known to commerce. Although unknown to this 
country — both the cigars and the leaf tobacco have a deserved 
reputation in Europe, and it is beyond all question one of the 
finest tobaccos in the world for cigars. These cigars have a 
delicacy of flavor unapproachable in any other variety, and 
may justly be termed the finest at least of all South Ameri- 
can cigars. It is one of the finest burning tobaccos in the 




PARAGUAY CIGARS. 



world, and does not fail to suit the taste of the most fastidi- 
ous of smokers. The finest are of dark color and wholly 
free from any rank or unpleasant taste. These cigars are 
uniformly mild and have but little variety of flavor, the ash 



BRAZILIAN CIGARS. 307 

is dark-colored, firm and strong, clinging with tenacity to the 
cigar, which is the best evidence of the quality of the leaf. 
In Paraguay they are considered superior to all other kinds 
and are smoked continuously without any seemingly ill effect. 
Page alludes to the custom of smoking as being universal, 
"Men, women, and children — delicate, refined girls, and 
youngsters who would not with us be promoted to the dignity 
of pantaloons — smoke with a gravity and gusto that is 
irresistibly ludicrous to a foreigner," The Paraguayans 
consider excessive smoking of other tobacco as injurious but 
not of the delicate flavored leaf of Paraguay, These cigars 
are rolled firm and strong usually small and hold fire until 
the entire cigar has been consumed, 

GUATEMALA CIGAES. 

This variety of cigars, although of excellent flavor, is 
hardly known outside of Central America. They are made 
from Guatemala tobacco — one of the few varieties of tobacco 
bearing white blossoms, and possessed of a similar flavor to 
Mexican tobacco. Although Guatemala tobacco has not 
been thoroughly tested by the great manufacturers of cigars 
either in Europe or America, it doubtless is well suited for 
cigars. It is a distinct variety from those kinds bearing 
pink and yellow blossoms, and its growth and quality would 
seem to suggest some doubt as to its quality and adaptability 
for cigars. Stephens and other travelers seem to regard it 
as tobacco of excellent quality, and allude to its constant 
use by the ladies who smoke jpuros, a cigar made of a single 
leaf, or formed entirely of tobacco. They also use the^«j;e- 
lotes wrapped in paper and sometimes in the dried leaf of 
maize. It would seem probable from the climate of Cen- 
tral America, that Guatemala tobacco would be exactly 
suited for the manufacture of cigars, but so little is known 
concerning it, and its cultivation is so limited, that at present 
it is simply a matter of conjecture. 

BRAZILIAN CIGAES. 
s The cigars of Brazil, like those made of South American 



308 AMERICAN CIGARS. 

tobacco, are noted for their superior flavor. They are made 
of " Brazilian Aromatic " one of the finest tobaccos of Brazil. 
Although but little known in this country, both the tobacco 
and the cigars are highly esteemed in Europe, where most of 
the leaf is sent. Both Brazilian cigars and the celebrated 
"Tauri Cigarettes " possess a delicacy of flavor, described by 
travelers as unapproachable by any other variety of cigars and 
cigarettes. A late traveler says concerning them : — " Accus- 
tomed to smoke only Havana cigars, I was unprepared to re- 
cognize any others as being worthy even of the name of cigars. 
I was presented with a bo^i of Brazilian cigars of commend- 
able size and finish, of a dark color and of a good flavor, 
before trying them, I ignited one, merely to test their 
quality and not from any impression that they were worth 
even the value of the cheapest Havanas. Great was my sur- 
prise to find them of an agreeable flavor and very pleasant 
to the taste." 

The leaf is very thin, and without doubt, well suited for a 
cigar wrajDper. The flavor of all cigars made from South 
American tobacco is similar, especially those made from 
tobacco grown east of the Andes. A writer, alluding to 
their mode of manufacturing cigars for their own use says : 

" They take the leaf after it is cured and ready for manu- 
facture into cigars, and dampen it, not wath pure water but 
with water containing the juice of the poppy so as to pro- 
duce the efifect of opium. When prepared in this manner 
they are much esteemed by the Brazilians and especially 
by the herders." 

AMEEICAN CIGAES. 

This was the name given to cigars made some forty or fifty 
years ago composed of Connecticut seed-leaf, or as it was 
then called, American tobacco. The fillers were selected 
from various kinds of tobacco, including Yirginia, Kentucky, 
and Spanish, using for a wrapper Spanish, American or 
Maryland leaf. At this time the tobacco was not sorted as 
now, and was made up into cigars after being stripped, but 
the cigars after being manufactured were kept for some time 
before they were sold. At this time but little pains compar- 
atively was taken in their manufacture : they were not as- 
sorted or shaded according to the present standard, and were 



CONNECTICUT SEED-LEAF AND HAVANA CIGARS. 309 

packed in chestnut instead of cedar boxes containing from 
one to five hundred cigars each. A manufacturer of cigars 
nearly fifty years ago gives the following account of his 
method : " We selected for wrappers those leaves having 
white specks (white rust) upon them, which greatly in- 
creased the sale of the cigars, and which were considered by 
emokers to be much better than those not wound with fancy 
wrappers. After the cigars were packed in the boxes a little 
Spanish bean was grated upon the cigars, or a single bean was 
placed between the cigars in the box." At this time some 
little taste was evinced for colors, and cigars of a " bright cin- 
namon red," and afterwards, of a dark brown, were consid- 
ered the finest, while leaf that was black was considered 
worthless for wrappers. A kind of cigar which is distinctly 
American and which is made to a considerable extent, is 
called a seed cigar, and is made from tobacco grown in Con- 
necticut, New York, Pennsylvania, or Ohio. These cigars 
have but little reputation, and are of inferior quality and 
manufacture. A very good cigar, call a " sprig cigar," is 
made from Havana and Connecticut seed-leaf filler wound 
with a seed wrapper which gives a good fiavor similar to 
clear Havana. 

A full flavored cigar like a sip of rare old wine is inspir- 
ing to a lover of the " royal plant " and amid the sublime 
and companionable thoughts that its fragrance engenders, 
one is led oftentimes to reflect on its rare virtues and the 
benign efiects it produces wherever known. Thus it light- 
ens the toil of the weary laborer plodding along the highway 
of life. The student poring over musty tomes sees with a 
clearer perception as its fragrance accompanies him along 
the pathway of science and of history. The poet '* as those 
wreathes up go " sees Helicon's fresh founts flowing clearer 
and purer. The musician "lord of sounds," evokes tones 
from his instrument never before heard by mortal ear. The 
w^arrior, "fresh from glory's field" is charmed by its fra- 
grance as he dreams of shattered battalions and sleeping 
hosts. The farmer nurtured amid the odors of the " balmy 



310 THE EXILE'S COMFORT. 

plant " honors the " useless weed " as a promoter of happi- 
ness and an increaser of gains. While : 

" Kings smoke when they ruminate 
Over grave affairs of state." 

The exile too, far from home and kindred smokes on as 
he muses of happier hours gone never to return. And thus 
amid all the varied ranks and walks of life this solace of the 
mind and comfort of life exhales its fragrance and breathes 
its benedictions over aU. 




CHAPTER X. 

TOBACCO PLANTERS AND PLANTATIONS. 

"HE grounds selected for the cultivation of tobacco 
are called by various names even in the same coun- 
tries. Thus in the Connecticut Yallej, such lands 
are called tobacco fields, at the South they are known 
as tobacco plantations, while in Cuba they are called Yegas 
or tobacco farms. In Cuba almost the entire tobacco farm 
is planted to tobacco while at the South and in New Eng- 
land this is rarely the case unless the plantations or tobacco 
farms are small and contain but a few acres. In the Connect- 
icut Yalley and more especially along the banks of the 
Connecticut River, where the farms are frequently small, 
this is sometimes the case but farther removed from the 
river, where the farms are much larger but a few acres of the 
best land is used for this purpose. 

In the Connecticut Yalley the tobacco fields average from 
one to forty acres, rarely exceeding the latter and indeed 
seldom including as large an area. The average size of 
tobacco fields is about five acres — sometimes all in one lot 
but oftener divided into several small pieces on various parts 
of the farm. 

The Connecticut planter is deeply interested in the plant 
and gives it his undivided attention from seed-sowing until 
it is sold to the speculator or manufacturer. All other crops 
in his opinion are of but little importance compared with the 
great New England product, one crop is frequently not off 
his hands before he is preparing for another. The Connecti- 
cut planter stands first in the rank of tobacco growers ; he is 

311 



312 



THE CONNECTICUT PLANTER. 



thoroughly acquainted with the nature of the plant and knows 
just what land to select and what kind of fertilizers to apply. 
He has reduced the cultivation to almost an exact science 
and can obtain (the season being favorable) the color most 
desirable. He has thoroughly tested all kinds of fertilizers, 
and knows just what kinds will produce the various shades 
of color as well as the desired texture and size of leaf. No 
other tobacco planter so thoroughly understands the methods 
of curing, sweating and doing up the crop, and he takes no 
little pride in showing his crop to the buyer. 

It is his aim to obtain not only the best leaf for a cigar-wrap- 
per but also a tobacco of the finest possible flavor; hence he 
tries the principal varieties grown in Cuba, Brazil and other 
countries in order to judge of their quality and whether they 
can be cultivated with profit on his lands. He has the best 
constructed sheds for hanging and curing and the latest and 
most improved agricultural implements for the cultivation 
of the plants. The greatest pains are taken in securing the 

crop and harvesting and handling the plants without injur- 




CONNKCTICUT TOBACCO FIELD. 



ing the leaves. The tobacco fields are kept in the best pos- 
sible condition, no weeds or grass is allowed to grow and 



INTELLIGENCE OF TOBACCO GROWERS. 313 

the entire surface is as free from stones as a lawn. He 
usually, if his farm is small, plants the same field year after 
year, securing a much finer leaf and by yearly manuring 
keeping the ground fertile and in good condition. When 
the tobacco is stripped the utmost care is taken to assort the 
leaves and he frequently shades or assorts the colors, 
obtaining fancy prices for such " selections." 

The Connecticut grower is well acquainted with the difier- 
ent soils, and is able to judge with considerable accuracy in 
regard to selecting the right fields for tobacco. The warmest 
land is chosen — mellow and free from stones or shaded by 
trees and prepared as if for a garden. All of the improved 
methods of obtaining early plants as well as transplanting, 
Le adopts, and in spite of early freezing, is generally able to 
outwit Jack Frost, and secure the plants before this great foe 
of the weed ravages the fields. It may safely be said of the 
Connecticut planter that he secures more even crops than any 
other grower of the plant, and obtains the finest colored leaf 
for cigar wrappers. 

The growers are thoroughly informed as regards the prices, 
and although the buyers may steal suddenly upon them, are 
generally prepared to " set " a price upon their crops. Some 
refuse to sell on the poles, or even after it is stripped, pre- 
ferring to pack their tobacco until it has passed through the 
sweat, when larger prices are obtained. Many growers not 
only pack their own crop, but buy up that of others, thus 
acting as both producer and buyer. During the growing of 
the crop, and particularly after it has been cured and stripped, 
the growers congregate together, and talk over the condition 
of the crop and the prices likely to be realized. Sometimes 
they form an association or club, agreeing to " hold " the 
tobacco for satisfactory prices, and frequently employing an 
agent to sell the crop. Many of the tobacco fields or farms 
in the Connecticut valley are very valuable, especially those 
near large cities and means of transportation ; such lands 
often selling for one thousand dollars per acre. 

The finest tobacco lands in the Connecticut valley are 



314 BEST CONNECTICUT TOBACCO LANDS. 

located in the vicinity of Hartford about fifty miles from 
Long Island Sound, These lands are near enough to the 
sound to get the salts in the atmosphere from the south 
winds that blow up the valley in the precise amount which 
the plant needs. Not much farther north does the atmos- 
phere possess this peculiar quality, while lower down the 
river the salt air is too strong for the plant, and the leaves in 
consequence are thick and harsh. Fine tobacco leaves can 
be manufactured as well as fine broadcloth or costly silks. 
These results depend in a great manner upon the proper soil 
and the fertilizers, applied together with the most thorough 
cultivation of the plants. The soil of our best Connecticut 
tobacco fields is alluvial, varying in composition from a heavy 
sandy loam to a light one containing very little clay. 

For the past few years light soil has been preferred for 
the tobacco field, on account of the demand for light colored 
leaf. The soil can hardly be too light when leaf of a light 
cinnamon color is desired ; as the color of all kinds of tobacco 
depends upon the soil and the fertilizers used. 

A quarter of a century since Havana tobacco commanded 
very high prices, both in this country and in Europe. It 
burnt freely and purely. The Cuban planters, although get- 
ting rich on the ordinary crops, were not satisfied with their 
gains, and attempted to increase their crops by the use of 
guano and artificial fertilizers. They secured heavier crops, 
but the quality became poorer. The prices fell off and the 
planters did not realize as much for their crops as formerly, 
although the growth was larger. About this time Connecti- 
cut seed leaf became known as a cigar wrapper, and in a short 
time took the lead for this purpose, as it still continues to. 
It cured finely, burnt white and free, and in a short time 
brought high prices. The profit realized from its growth led 
some Connecticut growers into the same mistake as it did 
the Cuban planters, when they, by misguided culture, nearly 
ruined their crops and injured the reputation of Cuban 
tobacco. 

Artificial fertilizers and strong manure produce a leaf 



LOVE FOR THE PLANT. 



315 



larger ami heavier, but their effect on the character of the 
leaf is injurious, the salts destroying its fine qualities, so that 
it sweats and cures poorly, and compared with the finest leaf 
burns dark and emits a rank and unpleasant odor. 

The Connecticut tobacco grower requires considerable 
capital when engaged extensively in the business, as ordinarily 
he buys large quantities of fertilizers and requires many 
hands to cultivate the crop. On the largest tobacco farms 
the sheds or " hanging houses" are built near or in the field, 
and are sometimes very large, say two or three hundred feet 
in length, and capable of holding the crop of from five to ten 
acres. 

His broad fields of the weed can usually be seen from his 
house and he loves to show to visitors the plants growing in 




HOMK OF THE CONNECTICUT PLANTER. 



all their luxuriance, or to sit on his piazza and call attention 
to their waving leaves and graceful showy tops. Few 
tobacco-growers can discuss the relative merits of the num- 
erous varieties like the Connecticut planter, and he is well 



316 KNOWLEDGE OF THE PLANT. 

acquainted not only with the various kinds grown in his 
own country but also with those of others. Indeed you may 
often see growing in his garden specimens of Cuban, 
Brazil or Latakia tobacco ; such is his love for all that per- 
tains to this great tropical plant. He considers it one of the 
greatest of all the vegetable products and never tires of 
lauding the plant and its use. He sincerely hates all anti- 
tobaccoites and has a supreme disgust for the memory of 
King James I. and all royal foes of the plant. He is, how- 
ever, a man of large and liberal views and bestows his favors 
with a princely hand. If fortune frowns he may lessen his crop 
but never his attachment for the plant. Amid all the cares 
and perplexities incident to life, he puffs away and as the 
ashes drop from his cigar meditates upon the probable future 
of tobacco growers and all users of the weed. 

The Connecticut tobacco grower is in all respects a man of 
genuine refinement and nobility of soul. He is always 
ready to give information on his particular system of culture, 
and how he obtains such large and fine crops. He is a good 
judge of leaf tobacco, and can tell in a moment the quality 
of his famous variety. He is thoroughly awake to modem 
improvements, and always willing to try new implements, 
Buch as tobacco hangers or transplanters in his sheds or fields. 
He is just the person one likes to meet, jovial and good- 
natured ; he naturally loves the plant he cultivates and uses 
it freely ; lighting his after-dinner cigar or evening pipe with 
a gusto that is peculiar to the grower of tobacco everywhere. 
Indeed he is hardly in a proper frame of mind to converse 
about tobacco until he lights a cigar. 

No other cultivator of the soil gains as many friends as 
the tobacco-grower. His table is well supplied from the 
choicest his larder affords and he cheerfully welcomes all to 
its side. He is the friend of the poor and the companion of 
the rich. No meanness or low chicanery is his. His attach- 
ment for home, friends, and country is as firm and strong as 
for the plant he cultivates. 

Olmsted in his work " The Seaboard Slave States " 



VIRGINIA PLANTERS. 



317 



gives the following description of a Virginia plantation : 
" Half an hour after this 1 arrived at the negro quarters — 
a little hamlet of ten or twelve small and dilapidated cabins. 
Just beyond them was a plain farm gate at which several 
negroes were standing ; one of them, a well-made man, with 




NEGRO QUARTERS. 



an intelligent countenance and prompt manner, directed me 
how to find my way to his owner's house. It was still nearly 
a mile distant; and yet, until I arrived in its immediate 
vicinity, I saw no cultivated field, and but one clearing. 

" In the edge of this clearing, a number of negroes, male 
and female, lay stretched out upon the ground near a small 
smoking charcoal pit. Their master afterwards informed 
me that they were burning charcoal for the plantation black- 
smith, using the time allowed them for holidays — from Christ- 
mas to New Years — to earn a little money for themselves in 
this way. He paid them by the bushel for it. When I said 
that I supposed he allowed them to take what wood they 
chose for this purpose, he replied that he had five hundred 
acres covered with wood, which he would be very glad to 
have any one burn, or clear ofi" in any way. Cannot some 
Yankee contrive a method of concentrating some of the 
valuable properties of this old field pine, so that they may 
be profitably brought into use in more cultivated regions ? 
Charcoal is now brought from Virginia; but when made 
from pine it is not very valuable, and will only bear trans- 
portation from the banks of the navigable rivers whence it 



318 



HOUSE AND SURROUNDINGS. 



can be shipped, at one movement to New York. Tm'pentine 
does not flow in sufficient quantity from this variety of the 
pine to be profitably collected, and for lumber it is of very 
small value. 

" Mr. W.'s house was an old family mansion, which he 
had himself remodeled in the Grecian style, and furnished 
with a large wooden portico. An oak forest had originally 
occupied the ground where it stood ; but this having been 
cleared and the soil worn out in cultivation by the previous 
proprietors, pine woods now surrounded it in every direction ; 
a square of a few acres only being kept clear immediately 
about it. A number of the old oaks still stood in the rear 







THE planter's HOME. 

of the house, and. until Mr. W. commenced his improvements, 
there had been some in its front. These, however, he had 
cut away, as interfering with the symmetry of his grounds, 
and in place of them had ailanthus trees in parallel rows. 

" On three sides of the outer part of the cleared square 
there was a row of large and comfortable-looking negro 
quarters, stables, tobacco-houses, and other offices, built of 
logs. Mr. W. was one of the few large planters, of his 
vicinity, who still made the culture of tobacco their principal 



A VIRGINIA PLANTATION. 319 

business. He said there was a general prejudice against 
tobacco, in all the tide water regions of the State, because it 
was through the culture of tobacco that the once fertile soil 
had been impoverished ; but he did not believe that, at the 
present value of negroes, their labor could be applied to the 
culture of grain with any profit, except under peculiarly- 
favorable circumstances. Possibly the use of guano might 
make wheat a paying crop, but he still doubted. He had 
not used it, himself. Tobacco required fresh land, and was 
rapidly exhausting, but it returned more money, for the 
labor used upon it, than anything else ; enough more, in his 
opinion to pay for the wearing out of the land. If he was 
well paid for it, he did not know why he should not wear 
out his land. His tobacco-fields were nearly all in a distant 
and lower part of his plantation; land which had been 
neglected before his time, in a great measure, because it had 
been sometimes flooded, and was, much of the year, too wet 
for cultivation. He was draining and clearing it, and it now 
brought good crops. He had had an Irish gang draining for 
him, by contract. He thought a negro could do twice as 
much work in a day as an Irishman. He had not stood over 
them and seen them at work, but judged entirely from the 
amount they accomplished: he thought a good gang of 
negroes would have got on twice as fast. He was sure they 
must have ' trifled ' a great deal, or they would have accom- 
plished more than they had. He complained much of their 
sprees and quarrels. I asked why he should employ Irish- 
men, in preference to doing the work with his own hands. 
' It's dangerous work, (unhealthy !) and a negro's life is too 
valuable to be risked at it. If a negro dies it's a considerable 
loss, you know.' He afterwards said that his negroes never 
worked so hard as to tire themselves — always were lively, 
and ready to go off on a frolic at night. He did not think 
they ever did half a fair day's work. They could not be 
made to work hard : they never would lay out their strength 
freely, and it was impossible to make them do it. This is 
just what I have thought when I have seen slaves at work — 
they seem to go through the motions of labor without putting 
strength into them. They keep their powers in reserve for 
their own use at night, perhaps. 

" Mr. W. also said that he cultivated only the coarser and 
lower-priced sorts of tobacco, because the finer sorts required 
more pains-taking and discretion than it was possible to make 
a large gang of negroes use. ' You can make a nigger work,' 
he said, ' but you cannot make him think.' " 



320 EARLY CULTURE OF TOBACCO. 

In speaking of tlie early tobacco culture of Virginia, he 
says : — 

The light, rich mould resting on the sandy soil of Eastern 
Yirginia was exactly suited to the cultivation of tobacco, and 
no better climate for this plant was to be found on the globe. 
This had just been sufficiently proved, and a suitable method 
of culture learned experimentally, when the land was offered 
to individual proprietors by the king, (James I.) Yery little 
else was to be obtained from the soil which would be of value 
to send to Europe, without an application to it of a higher 
degree of art than the slaves, or stupid, careless servants of 
the proprietors could readily be forced to use. Although 
tobacco had been introduced into England but a few years, 
an enormous number of persons had initiated themselves in 
the appreciation of its mysterious value. 

" The king, having taken a violent prejudice against it, 
though he saw no harm in the distillation of grain, had for- 
bidden that it should be cultivated in England. Virginia, 
therefore, had every advantage to supply the demand. Mer- 
chants and the super-cargoes of ships, arriving with slaves 
from Africa, or manufactured goods, spirits, or other luxuries 
from England, very gladly bartered them with the planters 
for tobacco, but for nothing else. Tobacco, therefore, stood 
for money, and the passion for raising it, to the exclusion of 
everything else, became a mania, like the ' California fever ' 
of 1849. 

" The culture being once established, there were many 
reasons growing out of the social structure of the colony, 
which, for more than a century, kept the industry of the 
Virginians confined to this one staple. These reasons were 
chiefly the difficulty of breaking the slaves, or training the 
bond-servants to new methods of labor, the want of enterprise 
or ingenuity of the proprietors to contrive other profitable 
occupations for them, and the difficulty or expense of dis- 
tributing the guard or oversight, without which it was impos- 
sible to get any work done at all, if the laborers were separated, 
or worked in any other way than side by side, in gangs, as 
in the tobacco-fields. 

" Owing to these causes the planters kept on raising tobacco 
with hardly sufficient intermission to provide sustenance, 
though often, by reason of the excessive quantity raised, 
scarcely anything could be got for it. Tobacco is not now 
considered peculiarly and excessively exhaustive ; in a judi- 
cious rotation, especially as a preparation for wheat, it is an 



ACTS LIMITING QUANTITY. 321 

admirable fallow crop, and, under a scientific system of agri- 
culture, it is grown with no continued detriment to the soil. 
But in Virginia it was grown without interruption or alter- 
nation, and the plantations rapidly deteriorated in fertility. 
As they did so, the crops grew smaller in proportion to the 
labor expended upon them ; yet, from the continued impor- 
tation of laborers, the total crops of the colony increased 
annually, and the market value fell proportionately to the 
better supply. 

"With smaller return for labor and lower prices, the 
planters soon found themselves bankrupt, instead of nabobs. 
How could they help themselves? Only by forcing the 
merchants to pay them higher prices. But how to do that, 
when every planter had his crop pledged in advance, and 
was obliged to hurry it off at any price he could get for it, 
in order to pay for his food, and drink, send clothing, and to 
keep his head above water at credit for the following year. 
The crop supplied more tobacco than was needed, but no one 
man would cease to plant it, or lessen his crop for the general 
good. Then it was agreed all men must be made to do so, 
and the colonial legislature was called upon to make them. 

" Acts wpre accordingly passed to prevent any planter from 
cultivating more than a certain number of plants to each 
hand he employed in labor, and prescribing the number of 
leaves which might be permitted to ripen upon each plant 
permitted to be grown. An inspection of all tobacco, after 
it had been prepared for market, was decreed, and the in- 
spectors were bound by oath, after having rejected all of 
inferior quality, to divide the good into two equal parts, and 
then to burn and destroy one of them. Thus, it was ex- 
pected the quantity of tobacco offered for sale would be so 
small that merchants would be glad to pay better prices for 
it, and the planters would be relieved of their embarrass- 
ment." 

Mrs. M. P. Handy gives the following interesting sketch, 
entitled " On the Tobacco Plantation " : — 

" Riding through Southside, Virginia, any warm, bright 
winter's day after Christmas, the stranger may be startled to 
see a dense column of smoke rising from the forest beyond. 
He anxiously inquires of the first person he meets — probably 
a negro — if the woods are on fire. Cuffee shows his white 
teeth in a grin that is half amusement, half contempt, as he 
answers: 'No, sar, deys jis burnin' a plant-patch.' For this 
is the first step in tobacco-culture. 
21 



322 



THE " PLANT-PATCH." 



" A sunny, sheltered spot on the southern slope of a hill is 
selected, one protected from northern winds by the surround- 



%,"?; '*45ti|^Fx:=^ -' ^ vjimm-^mmsi ^ 










"burning the patch." 

ing forest, but open to the sun in front, and here the hot-bed 
for the reception of the seed is prepared. All growth is 
felled within the area needed, large dead logs are dragged 
and heaped on the ground as for a holocaust, the whole 
ignited, and the fire kept up until nothing is left of the im- 
mense wood-heap but circles of the smoldering ashes. These 
are afterward carefully plowed in ; the soil, fertilized still 
further, if need be, is harrowed and prepared as though for 
a garden-bed, and the small brown seed sown, from which is 
to spring the most widely-used of man's useless luxuries. 
Later, when the spring fairly opens, and the young plants in 
this primitive hot-bed are large and strong enough to bear 
transplanting, the Virginian draws them, as the New Eng- 
lander does his cabbages, and plants them in like manner, in 
bills from two to four feet apart each way. Lucky is he whose 
plant-bed has escaped the fly, the first enemy of the precious 
weed. Its attacks are made upon it in the first stage of its 
existence, and are more fatal, because less easily prevented, 
than those of the tobacco-worm, that scourge, jmt excellence, 
of the tobacco crop. Farmers often lose their entire stock 
of plants, and are forced to send miles to beg or buy of a 
more fortunate planter. Freshly -cleared land — ' new ground,' 
as the negroes call it — makes the best tobacco-field, and on 



PLANTING, TOPPING AND PRIMING. 



323 



this and the rich lowlands throughout Southside is raised 
the staple known through the world as James River tobacco. 

" On this crop the planter lavishes his choicest fertilizers ; 
for the ranker the growth, the longer and larger the leaf, the 
greater is the value thereof, though the manufacturers com- 
plain bitterly of the free use of guano, which, they say, 
destroys the resinous gum on which the value of the leaf 
depends. Once set, the young plant must contend, not only 
with the ordinary risk of transplanting, but the cut-worm is 
now to be dreaded. Working underground, it severs the 
stem just above the root, and the first intimation of its pres- 
ence is the prone and drooping plant. For this there is no 
remedy, except to plant and replant, until the tobacco itself 
kills the worm. In one instance, which came under our 
observation, a single field was replanted six times before the 
planter succeeded in getting 'a good stand,' as they call it on 
the plantations ; but this was an extreme case. 

"When the plants are fairly started in their growth, the 
planter tops and primes them, processes performed, the first 
by pinching off the top bud, which w^ould else run to seed, 
and the second by removing the lower leaves of each plant, 
leaving bare a space of some inches near the ground, and 
retaining from six to a dozen stout, well-formed leaves on 
each stem, according to the promise of the soil and season, 
and these leaves form the crop. The rejected lower leaves 







STRINGING THE PRIMINGS. 



or primings, in the days of slavery, formed one of the 
mistress' perquisites and were carefully collected by the 



324 SUCKERING. 

* house-gang,' as the force was styled, strung on small sharp 
sticks like exaggerated meat-skewers, and cured, first in the 
Bun, afterwards in the barn, often placing a pretty penny in 
her private purse. Now when all labor must be paid for in 
money, they are not worth collecting, and, except when some 
thrifty freedman has a large family which he wishes to turn 
to account, are left to wither where they fall. 

There is absolutely no rest on a large tobacco plantation, 
one step following another in the cultivation of the trouble- 
some weed — the last year's crop is rarely shipped to market 
before the seed must be sown for the next — and planting and 
replanting, topping and priming, suckeriug and worming, 
crowd on each other through all the summer months. 
Withal the ground must be rigidly kept free from grass and 
weeds, and after the plants have attained any size this must 
be done by hoe ; horse and plow would break and bruise the 
brittle leaves. 

"'Suckering' is performed by removing every leaf-bud 
which the plant throws out after the priming (and topping), 
thus retaining all its sap and strength for the development of 
the leaves already formed, and this must be done again and 
again through the whole season. Worming is still more 
tedious and unremitting. In the animal kingdom there are 
three creatures, and three only, to whom tobacco is not 
poisonous — man, a goat found among the Andes, and the 
tobacco-worm. This last is a long, smooth-skinned worm, 
its body formed of successive knobs or rings, furnished each 
with a pair of legs, large prominent eyes, and is in color as 
green as the leaf upon which it feeds. It is found only on 
the under side of the leaves, every one of which must be 
carefully lifted and examined for its presence. Women make 
better wormers than men, probably because they are more 
patient and painstaking. When caught the worm is pulled 
apart between the thumb and finger, for crushing it in the 
soft mold of the carefully cultivated fields is impossible. 
Carelessness in worming was an unpardonable offence in the 
days of slavery, and was frequently punished with great 
severity. An occasional penalty on some plantations — very 
few, in justice to Virginia planters be it said — was to compel 
the delinquent wormer to bite in two the disgusting worm 
discovered in his or her row by the lynx-eyed overseer. 
Valuable coadjutors in this work are the housewife's flock of 
turkeys, which are allowed the range of the tobacco lots near 
the house, and which destroy the worms by scores. The 



CROP-GATHERING. 325 

moth, whose egg produces these larvae, is a large wliite 
miller of unusual size and prolificness. Liberal and kind 
masters would frequently offer the negro children a reward 




for every miller captured, and many were the pennies won 
in this way. One of these insects, placed one evening under 
an inverted tumbler, was found next morning to have depos- 
ited over two hundred eggs on the glass. 

" As the plant matures the leaves grow heavy, and, thick 
with gum, droop gracefully over from the plant. Then as 
they ripen, one by one the plants are cut, some inches below 
the first leaves, with short stout knives, — scythe or reaper is 
useless here, — and hung, heads down, on scaffolds, in the 
open air, till ready to be taken to the barn. A Virginia 
tobacco-barn is totally unlike any other building under the 
Bun. Square as to the ground plan, its height is usually 
twice its width and length. In the center of the bare earthen 
floor is the trench for firing ; around the sides runs a raised 
platform for placing the leaves in bulk ; and, commencing at 
a safe distance from the fire, up to the top of the tall 
building, reach beams stretching across for the reception of 
the tobacco-sticks, thick pine laths, from which are suspended 
the heavy plants. Safely housed and beyond all danger of 
the frost, whose slightest touch is sufficient to blacken and 
destroy it, the crop is now ready for firing, and through the 
late autumn days blue clouds of smoke hover over and 
around the steep roofs of the tall tobacco-barns. A stranger 



326 CURING AND SORTING. 

might suppose the buildings on fire, but not a blaze is within, 
the object here, as in bacon-curing, being smoJce, not fire. 

" For this the old field-pine is eschewed, and the planter 
draws on his stock of oak and hickory-trees. Many use sas- 
safras and sweet gum in preference to all other woods for this 
purpose, under the impression that they improve the flavor 
of the tobacco-leaf. When the leaves, fully cured, have taken 
the rich brown hue of the tobacco of commerce, so unlike the 
deep green of the growing plant that a person familiar with 
the one would never recognize the other as the same plant, 
the planter must fold his hands and wait until they are in 
condition for what is technically known as striking, i. e., 
taking down from the rafters on which they are suspended. 
Touch the tobacco when too dry and it crumbles, disturb it 
when too high or damp, and its value for shipping is materi- 
ally lessened, while if handled in too cold weather it becomes 
harsh. But there comes a mild damp spell, and the watchful 
planter seizing the right moment, since tobacco, like time and 
tide, waits for no man, musters all the force he can command 
for the work of stripping and stemming. This done, the 
leaves are sorted and tied in bundles, several being held in 
one hand, while around the stalk-end of the cluster is wrap- 
ped another leaf, the loose end of which is tucked through 
the center of the bundle. Great care is taken in this 
operation not to break the leaf, and oil or lard is freely used 
in the work. During this process the crop is divided into 
the various grades of commerce from ' long bright ' leaf to 
* lugs' the lowest grade known to manufacturers. These last 
are not packed into hogsheads, but are sent loose, and sold 
without the trouble of prizing, in the nearest market-town. 

" Shades imperceptible to a novice, serve to determine the 
value of the leaf. As it varies in color, texture, and length, 
BO fluctuates its market price, and at least half the battle lies 
in the manner in which the crop has been handled in curing. 
From the mountainous counties of South-western Virginia, 
Franklin, Henry, and Patrick, comes all the rarest and the 
most valuable tobacco, * fancy wrappers ' but these crops are 
smaller in proportion to those raised along the lowlands 
of the rivers. This tobacco is much lighter in coloj, much 
softer in texture, than the ordinary staple, and is frequently 
as soft and fine as silk. Some years ago a bonnet made of 
this tobacco was exhibited at the Border Agricultural Fair, 
and had somewhat the appearance of brown silk. Only one 
such plant have I ever seen grown in Southside, and that, a 



TOBACCO MARKETS. 327 

bright golden brown, and nearly two feet in length, was 
carefully preserved for show on the parlor-mantel of the 
planter who raised it. 

" After tying, the bundles are placed in bulk, and when 
again ' in order,' are ' prized ' or packed into the hogsheads, 
— no smoothly -planed and iron-hooped cask, by the way, but 
huge pine structures very roughly made. The old machine 
for prizing was a primitive aifair, the upright beam through 
which ran another at right angles, turning slightly on a pivot, 
heavily weighted at one end, and used as a lever for com- 
pressing the brown mass into the hogsheads. Now, most 
well-to-do planters own a tobacco straightener and screw- 
press, inventions which materially lessen the manual labor 
of preparing the crop for market. Each hogshead is branded 
with the name of the owner, and thus shipped to his com- 
mission-merchant, when the hogshead is ' broken ' by tear- 
ing off a stave, thus exposing the strata of the bulk to view. 
Of late years some planters have been guilty of ' nesting,' or 
placing prime leaf around the outer part and an inferior 
article in the center of the hogshead. 

" At a tobacco mart in Southside, occurred perhaps the 
only instance of negro-selling since the establishment of the 
Freedman's Bureau. At every town is a huge platform scale 
for weighing wagon and load, deducting the weight of the 
former from the united weight of both to find the quantity 
of tobacco offered for sale. A small planter has brought a 
lot of loose tobacco to market, which, being sold, wds weighed 
in this manner, and for which the purchaser was about to 
pay, when a bystander quietly remarked, 'You forgot to 
weigh the nigger.' An explanation followed, and the 
tobacco, re-weighed, was found short 158 lbs., or the exact 
weight of the colored driver, who had, unobserved, been 
standing on the scales behind the cart while the first weigh- 
ing took place. 

" Thirty years or more ago — before the Danville and 
Southside Railroads were built — the tobacco was principally 
carried to market on flat-boats, and the refrain to a favorite 
negro song was : — 

" ' Oh, I'm gwine down to Town ! 
An' I'm gwine down to Town ! 
I'm gwine down to Richmond Town 
To cayr my 'bacca down !' 

*' Then all along the rivers, at every landing, was a tobacco 
■warehouse, the ruins of some of which may still be seen. 



328 FIRST WESTERN PLANTERS. 

With no crop has the Emancipation Act interfered so much 
as with this, and the old tobacco planters will tell you with 
a sigh that tobacco no longer yields them the profits it once 
did : the manufacturers are the only people who make for- 
tunes on it now-a-days ; $12 per hundred is the lowest price 
which pays for the raising, and few crops average that now. 
Still every farmer essays its culture, every freedman has his 
small tobacco patch by his cabin door, and the Indian weed 
is still the great staple of Eastern Virginia." 

The first planters of tobacco at the West were the Ohioans, 
who began its culture about fifty years ago. From the first 
they have taken much interest in the plant, and as the result 
of many experiments not only produce seed leaf, but the 
finest cutting leaf grown in this country. The Ohio tobacco 
growers have shown a spirit of enterprise in this direction 
that is as commendable as it is rare. While they have not 
tested the great tropical varieties like their brother tobacco 
growers of Connecticut, they have succeeded in producing a 
leaf for cutting that is the admiration of the world. At first 
their experiments were unsuccessful, and the early growers 
were ridiculed for entertaining the belief that tobacco could 
be grown at the West. Yet despite all objections and seem- 
ing failures, the growers continued its cultivation until it has 
become one of the great products of the State. Of late the 
Ohio growers have demonstrated that their soil is better 
adapted for the finer grades of cutting leaf, than for seed leaf 
or even the more common "cinnamon blotch." 

The soil is rich, and an experience of half a century has at 
length given them a thorough knowledge of the plant and 
the most successful modes of cultivation. In appearance an 
Ohio tobacco field resembles those of the Connecticut valley 
— the leaf is large, and though coarser, cures down a dark 
rich brown, like " cinnamon blotch," or a light yellow, the 
color of the famous "white tobacco." The Ohio growers 
have taken much pains with the Ohio broad leaf, and have 
produced a seed leaf tobacco that in many respects is a supe- 
rior wrapper for cigars. While it does not possess the fine 
texture of Connecticut seed leaf it still has many good quali- 
ties, and with the careful culture given it will doubtless 



OHIO TOBACCO. 



329 



become still finer as a leaf tobacco, for wrapping cigars. 
But it is in the production of cutting leaf that the Ohio 
growers take rank, and ere long will supply the vast demand 
made upon them for their great cutting variety. 

With a degree of pride peculiar to all tobacco growers, 
(when any new variety has originated,) they point with no 
little egotism to their fields of " white tobacco," and ask their 
fellow-growers of New England to rival this " great plant." 
So successful have they been of late with cutting leaf, that 
their fields yield them returns not inferior to many of the 
choicest tobacco farms on the Connecticut River. The Ohio 
growers have one ads'antao;e over earlier growers of the plant 




OHIO TOBACCO FIELD. 



— their land has not been cultivated as long as the famous 
tobacco lands of the Connecticut valley, and does not require 
that thorough fertilizing which is so necessary in New Eng- 
land. Still the tobacco field cannot be too thoroughly pre- 
pared for the growth of tobacco, whether in the tropics or in 
the more temperate regions. 

In the curing of tobacco, the Ohio growers have but few 
equals, and no superiors. At first, the complaint made by 
tlie buyers of Ohio tobacco was, that " Ohio tobacco has tha 



330 MODE OF CURE. 

appearance of being too hard fired, indeed so much so as to 
have the flavor of being baked." The early culture of to- 
bacco in the State attracted the attention of tobacco buyers, 
especially those who had dealt largely in Maryland leaf, and 
so much so, that one large firm issued a circular and sent to 
all the prominent growers in the tobacco growing section 
giving instructions in regard to its cultivation and manage- 
ment. We copy from one lying before us, and dated 1842. 
It reads as follows : "As tobacco is every year becoming a 
more prominent article in your State, we deem it of so much 
importance that we have had this circular printed on the sub- 
ject of its Cultivation and Management, and take the liberty 
to address it to you. New ground produces the finest and 
highest priced tobacco. The plants should be set about 2 
feet 9 inches or three feet apart, which will give them suffi- 
cient air and sun to ripen, and give the leaf a good body. It 
should be topped as soon as it buttons, kept clear of suck- 
ers, and cut as soon as it is ripe — if favorable weather, it will 
be fit for the house in 15 to twenty days after it is topped. 

"When cut, let it remain until sufficiently lank to handle 
without breaking ; but it should be housed before it is sun- 
killed, or much deadened, to prevent which, put it up in 
small heaps, say as much as a man can carry, with the heads 
to the sun, as soon as cut, and even then the top plants may 
be too much deadened, unless soon removed to the house. 
If sun-killed, it will not cure fine. The Maryland system is 
to fire without flues, and when the precaution is taken to lay 
planks or boards directly over the fire, accidents seldom occur. 
" Slow fires are kept up for the first four or five days after 
the house is filled, so as to give it a moderate heat through- 
out, until the Tobacco is generally yellow, then the fires are 
raised or increased so as to kill the leaf and stem in forty- 
eight hours or less. When cured on the stock, as is done in 
Maryland, it can be better assorted, or the different qualities 
more readily separated than when stripped in the field and 
cured in the leaf. When stripping and tying up in bundles, 
it should be assorted according to the following classifica- 
tions : 1st, Fine Yellow ; 2d, Yellow ; 3d, Spangled ; 4th, 
Fine Red ; 5th, Good Red ; 6th, Brown and Common. It 
is often put up as if there were but two or three qualities, 
hence there is a great mixture of the several sorts, which is 
a very serious disadvantage in selling, as the purchaser gener- 
ally values it at the price of the most inferior in the sample. 



TOBACCO IN OHIO, 33I 

" The process of curing unfired, or air-dried tobacco, is 
eimilar to the above, except the firing ; when so cnred, it is 
more difficult to condition, so as to make it keep ; but it 
generally sells quite as well. Planters should be very care- 
ful to have their Tobacco in good dry condition when they 
deliver it to the dealer or purchaser, as it is all-important to 
him to receive it free from dampness or moisture, which 
bruises it and injures its quality. We think such manage- 
ment as directed above would raise the value of Ohio to- 
bacco as high as similar quality of Maryland." 

As when first cultivated, the Ohio growers still select new 
land as the best adapted for tobacco, though not as easy of 
cultivation. When the tobacco growers are ready for pre- 
paring their " new ground " they invite in their friends and 
neighbors, and the field is "grubbed" in a short time. 
" Grubbing Day," with the young people, is an event of no 
common interest ; the farmers gather from the adjoining farms 
and with mirth and muscle soon render the field fit for the "In- 
dian herb." In the evening, the planter's home is filled with 
the young people, bent on having a right good time, and 
with " stripping the willow " and other games, close the day 
if not the night in the most enjoyable manner. Many of 
the country mer- 
chants take the to- 
bacco of the growers 
when in condition to 
handle, paying them 
(or at least a portion Hj 
of it,) in goods, or 
purchasing the to- 
bacco as they do 
other merchandise. 
They have large 
warehouses where 
they receive and 
pack the tobacco until shipped to market. In the early 
Spring the growers take their tobacco to the workhouses, 
where it is packed by the merchanta who frequently 




TOBACCO WAREHOUSE. 



332 KENTUCKY TOBACCO-GROWING. 

have a claim on tlie crop for advances made on the same. 

Having given a description of the Connecticut, Virginia 
and Ohio tobacco growers, we come now to the most exten- 
tensive cultivators of tobacco in America — the Kentuckians. 
With the exception of the Virginians they are the oldest 
growers of the plant in the United States,* and are confess- 
edly among the most thorough cultivators of the plant in the 
world. The soil of Kentucky is admirably adapted for the 
great staple, and along the banks of the Green Eiver may be 
seen the largest tobacco fields in the world. The plant 
attains a large size, and grows with a luxuriance common to 
all products grown in the famous " blue grass " region. 

The system adopted by the Kentucky growers is similar 
to that adopted by all growers of cut tobacco, and the fine 
quality of Kentucky " selections " has deservedly gained the 
leaf a reputation that must place it in the front rank of 
American tobacco. The vast quantity grown in the state is 
an evidence not only of the good quality of Kentucky 
tobacco, but of the adaptation of the soil and of the method 




KENTUCKY TOBACCO PLANTATION. 



of cultivation in use. As a cut tobacco, Kentucky-leaf is 
held in the highest esteem, the exportation of the leaf to all 
parts of Europe gaining for it a reputation hardly equaled 



•Kentucky was originally a part of Virginia. 



THE KENTUCKY PLANTER. 333 

by any Southern tobacco. The system of cultivation is simi- 
lar to that pursued by the Virginian, and the same process of 
curing is also adopted. 

The Kentucky growers generally succeed in getting a 
" good stand " and when once the plants have commenced 
to grow they come forward with a rapidity that is truly aston- 
ishing. The soil of Kentucky is well adapted for the pro- 
duction of the largest varieties of tobacco as well as the 
finest grades of cutting leaf. Much attention is paid to the 
selection of soil, that the light standard of Kentucky leaf 
may be further advanced. On the large plantations a vast 
amount of tobacco is grown, in some instances equaling the 
entire product of some of the tobacco-growing towns in the 
Connecticut Valley. The tobacco is packed in hogsheads, 
each one containing twelve hundred pounds, the same as in 
Virginia and Missouri. 

The Kentucky planter prides himself on the superior 
quality of tobacco, as well as his famous blooded stock. If 
there is anything more remarkable than the high character 
of the latter, it must certainly be the renowned plant which 
has given the wealthy planters of Kentucky a national popu- 
larity among all cultivators of tobacco. The Kentuckians are 
thorough in all of their methods of cultivation, and with the 
first stock and tobacco farms in the country bid fair to achieve 
still further honors as " tillers of the soil." Possessed of 
the largest means, they have brought their farms up to a high 
state of cultivation, and produce in their famous valleys the 
very finest of Nature's products. 

Kentucky planters are men of the largest endowments ; 
Nature, in her gifts to them has been most lavish, and the 
princely fortunes which they have acquired shows how well 
they have benefited by her munificence. In manners affable, 
and in benevolence unsurpassed, the Kentucky planter gains 
the plaudits of all. He is polite to both friend and foe, and 
possessed with all of that polished manner which marks the 
true gentleman, and especially all growers of the " kingly 
plant." Easy of approach, he has still that reserve that bids 



334 



TRAITS OF CHARACTER. 



all sycophants mark well their conduct and demeanor. On 
the plantation or at the race, the Kentuckian is ever in his 
best mood for recreation and enjoyment. 

His attachment for the horse has developed qualities of 
patience and thoroughness that are shown elsewhere than on 

the " course." Benefit- 
ing by years of training 
and study, the success 
that follows his efforts 
shows at once that such 
talents are not confined 
to a single field of op- 
erations. In many re- 
spects like the Virginia 
planter, they differ 
somewhat in their taste 
in all that pertains to 
the turf and the field. 
But we would not lose 
sight, among his many 
noble traits of charac- 
ter, of that love of his 
State that pre-eminent- 
ly characterizes the Kentuckian. He is justly proud of her 
soil and of her sons, and whether in the halls of Congress 
or on the field of carnage and blood, fears not to maintain 
the honor and safety of the one and the other. 

It is surprising to one acquainted with the growth of to- 
bacco and the value of the Southern States for its production 
that so small an area of land is devoted to its culture in 
Georgia, Florida and Louisiana. "When owned by Spain, 
"West F1ori' d^ g|& noted for its tobacco, and produced large 
quantities which were exported to Spain and France. The 
goil of Florida is well adapted for tobacco, and the rich hum- 
mock lands produce an excellent quality for cigars, not unlike 
Havana leaf. Its cultivation has been tried in various parts 
of the State, but the result has not warranted its cultivation 




THE KENTUCKY PLANTER. 



FLORIDA TOBACCO. 335 

to any great extent excepting in Gadsden County where 
the plant flourishes as well as in Cuba. 

The seed used in Havana and the plant resembles it so 
closely that even Cuban planters cannot distinguish it from 
that grown on the island. The mode of cultivation is nearly 
the same, and the soil is said to produce a leaf of tobacco 
similar to that of the celebrated Vuelta de Albajo, For- 
merly the product was sent to New Orleans, and the leaf 
was pronounced by some dealers to be bitter, but most of 
them considered it valuable. The planter selects the high 
lands or hummocks, the soil of which is light and rich for 
the tobacco field. The plants are carefully drawn from the 
bed, and transplanted afterwards. The mode of culture is 
to plow between the rows and hoe the plants carefully. 

A Florida tobacco field in appearance is not unlike a vega^ 
or Cuba tobacco field ; the same luxuriant growth of the 
forest may be seen on every hand, and the " queen of herbs " 
grows underneath or near the fragrant Orange and the stately 
Magnolia. The soil of Gadsden County is in some re- 
spects unlike that of the rest of the State in that there is an 
entire absence of limestone, which is found elsewhere all 
through Florida. The climate of the State is well adapted 
for the growth of tobacco, and is less changeable on the Gulf 
BJde than along the Atlantic coast. 

Formerly larger crops were raised than now. Under the 
old regime when on every plantation were a score or more of 
idle negro urchins, a large portion of the labor could be per- 
formed by them, such as worming, dropping the plants, and 
picking up the primings, while now the labor has to be paid 
for in money or its equivalent. At this time, the "wrapper 
leaf" was considered to be among the best for cigars, and 
brought high prices. In the days of slavery, tobacco was 
considered to be as profitable as the cotton crop, and good 
tobacco plantations were considered to be the most valuable 
in the State. 

This peculiar tobacco region is without doubt capable, with 
proper management, of producing a superior article for cigars, 



336 



FLORIDA PLANTATION. 



both wrappers and fillers, and when grown on " new ground " 
the staple is exceedingly fine. The leaf cures as rapidly, and 
is of as good color as in Cuba, and in a favorable season 
and when harvested fully ripe, is destitute of that bitter 
taste formerly ascribed to it. The plants grow large, and 
have that smooth, shiny appearance peculiar to Havana to- 




nORIDA TOBACCO PLANTATION. 



bacco, the leaves growing erect, and frequently covered with 
" specks " ol" " white rust," one of the best evidences of a 
fine flavored and a good-burning tobacco. A Florida tobacco- 
grower gives the following account of the plant : 

" The Gadsden ' wrapper-leaf was always in high repute, 
and extensively used in the manufacture of cigars, being in 
size, firmness, and texture fully equal to the best Cuba, and 
far superior to the Connecticut seed-leaf. Where the variety 
known as the Cuba filler has been tried, it has succeeded 
finely in this county, possessing that delicate and peculiar 
aroma so highly prized in the Havana cigars. We need but 
the capital to make the most profitable crop that is grown. 
It is a fact, that of all the counties of the State, many of 
them abounding in the very finest soil, Gadsden is the only 
one that has succeeded in making the Cuba tobacco a staple 
market-crop. Prior to 1860 it rivaled in net returns the 
great staple cotton, and from present indications, it is about 



SUPERIOR QUALITY OF TOBACCO. 337 

to resume its former status among the great agricultural 
products of the country." 

" Whether this success is attributable to any peculiarity 
in the elements of the soil, I am not able to determine, but 
this fact is worthy of note, that, except immediately on the 
banks of the Apalachicola River, which forms the Western 
boundary of the County, there is an entire absence of the 
rotten limestone which so largely pervades the other sections 
of the State. For the planter of limited means, there is no 
crop so well suited to his condition as the Cuba tobacco. 
To produce a given result there is a less area of land required 
than is demanded for the production of any other field crop. 
The cultivation, harvesting, and preparation for market is 
simple, and the labor so light that it may be participated in 
by every member of the family, male and female, over six 
years of age. The growth of the plant is so rapid, and its 
arrival at maturity so quick, that it never interferes with any 
of the provision crops, and rarely with a moderate cotton 
crop." 

In Louisiana the tobacco plant flourishes well and grows as 
well and as luxuriantly as sugar cane. Even along the banks 
of the Mississippi the plants attain good size, and succeed as 
finely as in some of the other parishes in the interior of the 
State. The Perique and Louisiana tobacco are the principal 
varieties cultivated, and attain nearly the size of Connecticut 
seed leaf. In St. James parish the soil seems well adapted 
for Perique tobacco, and here it readily takes on that black 
hue that is one of the peculiar features of this singular 
variety. In Coddo parish tobacco is cultivated to some 
extent, but does not produce a leaf equal to that grown in 
St. James Parish. The tobacco grown in the Parishes of 
Bossier and Natchitoches is used chiefly by the growers of 
the parishes and is fitted for both smoking and snufi*. 

The Louisiana planters have adopted the method of the 
French in doing up their tobacco — twisting it in rolls, or as 
the French call them, " Carrots." The planters of St. James 
Parish annually put up from ten to fourteen thousand car- 
rots of Perique, each carrot weighing about four pounds. 
Mr. Perique, from whom the tobacco takes its name, made 
many improvements in the manner of preparing th6 tobacco 
22 



338 



TOBACCO IN LOUISIANA. 



for market, one of which consisted in taking up the twisted 
lumps (after remaining in press for six months), spreading 
them to fifteen or sixteen inches in length and having com- 
pleted four pounds in weight, rolling it into a lump which 
retained its shape by means of a rope one-fourth inch in 
diameter, tightly twisted around it. The labor in pressing 
and twisting is entirely done by hand, and attended to with 
the most scrupulous care. 

The Creole planters sometimes raise two, and even three 
crops on the same field, two of them being the growths of 




LOniSIANA TOBACCO PLANTATION, 



suckers or shoots from the parent stock or stump. The 
growers of Peri que tobacco have tested Havana seed, but can 
see but little difference between the product and that from 
Virginia or Kentucky tobacco seed, while the growth is much 
smaller. In color Louisiana tobacco is very dark, entirely 
difierent from any other variety grown in the Mississippi 
valley. 

Some few years since tobacco culture was introduced into 
California, and the belief then entertained by those who 
planted the consoling weed, that the state would soon become 
as famous for raising tobacco as she now is for producing 



CALIFORNIA TOBACCO LANDS. 339 

wheat and gold seem likely to be realized. The soil and 
climate of California are admirably adapted for tobacco. In 
the valleys the land is a deep alluvial loam, easily worked, 
producing bountiful crops of the finest leaf tobacco. The 
planters have experimented with several varieties, including 
Havana, Florida, Latakia, Hungarian, Mexican, Virginia, 
Connecticut, Standard and White leaf. Large crops are 
grown, especially of Florida tobacco, which, with careful 
culture, produces two thousand five hundred pounds of 
merchantable leaf to the acre. The planters get their 
Havana seed from Cuba, preferring to do so rather than to 
risk the seed from their own plants. At first they used 
home-grown seed and could not see any serious deterioration 
or change in the quality of the tobacco, but a singular change 
in the form of the leaf took place. That from home-grown 
seed grew longer, and the veins or ribs, which in Havana 
tobacco stand out at right angles from the leaf stalks took an 
acute angle, and thus became longer and made up a greater 
part of the leaf. Of Florida tobacco the home-grown seed 
comes true. 

Tobacco is now being tested in the several counties in the 
State and with every promise of success. Many of the 
ranches seem well adapted for the plant and the planters are 
confident by their new process of curing, of being able to 
produce an article equal to the best Havana brand. The 
plants attain a remarkable size, and grow up like many kinds 
of tropical vegetation, without much care being bestowed 
upon them, although the plants are regularly cultivated and 
hoed. The planters are not troubled with that foe of most 
tobacco fields, " the worm." They attribute this in part to 
the excellence of their soil and partly to the abundance of 
birds and yellow jackets. The planters do not always " top " 
the Havana and do very little " suckering." If the ground 
is rich, and free from weeds they let one of the suckers from 
that root grow, and thus become almost as large and heavy 
as the original plant. They believe that the soil is strong 
enough to bear the plants and suckers, and that they get a 
better leaf and finer quality without suckering. 



340 HUMOROUS FEATURES. 

In summer the roads are very dusty in California, and this 
dust is a disadvantage to the tobacco planter. On some of 
the plantations double rows of shade trees are planted along 
the main roads, and gravel is spread on the interior roads ; 
and to protect the fields of tobacco from the high winds 
which sweep through the California valley, almonds and 
cottonwoods are planted for wind-breaks in the fields. 

Some of the planters employ Chinese to cultivate the 
plants, who are very careful in hoeing and weeding the 
tobacco, living an apparently jolly life in shanties near the 
fields. ^ A witty California correspondent of the Tobacco 
Z(?<z/' writes concerning the early cultivation of tobacco in 
that State : 

" We are doing a great many other things in California 
now besides raising grain, fruit, wine, wool, and gold. We 
are doing a lively business in tobacco. Fifteen years ago I 
was down East on one occasion when they were gathering 
the tobacco crop — which goes to New York, and, by a pro- 
cess equal to wine making, becomes Havana tobacco. It 
struck me that this country was admirably adapted to its 
cultivation, and I brought back some seed, which I gave to 
a friend living on the bank of the Sacramento River, 
instructing him to plant it as per direction given me. We 
sat down and calculated the immense fortune we would 
make raising tobacco, if the experiment was a success. A 
week later my friend, who was an impatient sort of a fellow, 
wrote me just a line — ' No results.' I replied, and asked him 
if he expected a crop of tobacco in seven days. A few weeks 
later he wrote, ' Here she comes ; ' two weeks later, ' How 
big is the stuff to be ? ' two weeks later, ' Not room for 
tobacco and me too. Who shall quit ? ' I heard no more for a 
month and thought I would go up and see it. I did so, and 
the steamboat landed me at my friend's ranch. I could not 
Bee the house, and hallooed. I heard an answer from the 
depths, and then following a path, I found my friend swing- 
ing in a hammock in the shade of a grove of tobacco trees. 
I desire to maintain my reputation for truth and veracity, so 
necessary to a correspondent, so I won't say how big or how 
high those tobacco plants were ; but my friend's hammock 
■was slung from them — and he was no feather-weight — the 
leaves completely embowered the cottage. I congratulated 
him on the results — such a grove and such a shade — and 



MEXICAN TOBACCO. 341 

moreover I said, ' You will be permanently rid of mosquitoes.' 
* Will I ! ' said he. ' Do you know that these gallinippers 
have learned to chew already, and the habit is spreading so 
that all the old he-fellows are coming down from Marysville 
to take a hand.' I inquired if my friend had cured any or 
smoked any. He pointed to a Manyanita pipe split open on 
the ground, and said. ' Before it was real strong, some three 
weeks ago, I tried a leaf in that pipe. Observe the result — 
busted it the second whiflf, and knocked me off the log I was 
sitting on.' Such was the first experiment in tobacco rais- 
ing in California. But now they have learned the trick. 
They have searched the State for the poorest and most bar- 
ren soil, and, having found it are cultivating a splendid 
article of genuine Havana leaf tobacco, manufacturing cigars 
as good as you get one time in twenty even in Havana, mak- 
ing several brands of smoking tobacco, and, lastly, an article 
of Louisiana perique, (' peruke ' proper,) that any old 
smoker would go into ecstasies over, fully equal, it is said to 
the genuine old-fashioned article, and that is saying a good 
deal. Now if we can supply the world with cigars and 
tobacco, we have got a dead sure thing for the future, even 
if gold gives out, grain fails and the pigs eat up all the fruit. 
Your people who have been paying fifteen cents apiece 
for genuine Havana cigars imported direct from — Connecti- 
cut, should rejoice and join in an earnest hooray ! " 

In Mexico the tobacco plantations exhibit a diversity of 
scenery not met with in other portions of America. The 
soil is well adapted for the crop, and on many of the planta- 
tions in the Gulf States the plant grows as finely as on any 
of the vegas of Cuba. The Mexicans are among the best 
cultivators of the plant in the world, and, like the Turks, 
prefer its culture to that of any product grown. The plant 
is a strong, vigorous grower, and ripens early, emitting an 
odor like that of Havana tobacco. The climate is so favora- 
ble that from one to three crops can be grown on the same 
field in one year, and yield a bountiful harvest without seem- 
ingly impoverishing the soil.* Transplanted in the summer 
or autumn, the plants grow through the winter months, and 

■Shepard says of the CHltiratlon of tobacco by the Indians :— " The tobacco which is raised 
on the Tehnantepec isthmus is aald, by good judges, to riral that of Cuba, and commantds. 
In the capital, equal prices with the far-famed Havana. It is cultivated br the Indians, 
whose fields, or 'milpas,' according to Indian custoni, are situated at some distance from 
their villages, often in the depths of Mie forest. Upon these little patches they bestow 
'Whatever labor is consistent with dislike for exertion, learing the rich soil to accompHBh 
the balance." 



342 MONOPOLY OF THE TOBACCO TRADE. 

in spring are gathered and taken to the sheds. Sartorius, in 
his work on Mexico, says of its culture on the plantation : — 
" Various kinds of tobacco are planted, mostly that with 
the short, dingy, yellow blossoms, which has a very large, 
strong leaf. But there is little doubt that the sorts would 
be more carefully selected, if the trade were not fettered by 
the monopoly. Most of the government planters enter into 
an arrangement with the small farmers and peasants who 
have to grow a certain number of plants, on condition of 
handing over the harvest at a low figure — six to eight dollars 
per crop. These aviados receive something in advance, and 
their chief profit consists in securing the sand leaf and the 




MEXICAN TOBACCO PLANTATION. 



greater part of the after-harvest, which they sell to the con- 
trabandists. It is indeed allowed to export whatever remains ; 
but it is attended with so many annoyances from the author- 
ities, that it is never attempted. The many ships which 
enter the Mexican harbor of the east coast with European 
manufactures, find no return freight except gold and silver, 
cochineal, vanilla, a few drugs and goat skins, all of which 
take up very little room in the ships (money is usually sent 



PLANTS AROUND VERA CRUZ. 343 

off in the English government steamers) ; consequently they 
must either proceed to Laguna to buy log-wood, or they must 
take in sugar, coffee, or tobacco, in a Cuban or Haytian port. 
As soon as tobacco becomes an export article, its cultivation 
must increase immensely in the Coast States, the Mexican 
being very partial to this branch of agriculture, which occu- 
pies him part of the year only." 

Mayer also alludes as follows to the same subject : — 

" A large portion of the tobacco sold in the republic is 
contraband; for the ridiculous and greedy restrictions and 
exactions with which a plant of such universal consumption 
is surrounded, necessarily disposes the people to violate laws 
which they feel were only made to impair their rights of 
production and trade under a constitution professing to be 
free." 

The government planters in the State of Vera Cruz ^ave 
large, fine plantations, and the plants are carefully tended 
and cultivated as in all countries where tobacco is a govern- 
ment monopoly. On each plant a certain number of leaves 
are taken off, including the sand leaf, which is thrown away, 
and everything in the way of topping and suckering performed 
as carefully as on the tobacco farms in Cuba. The small 
farmers who raise only a few thousand plants are not as 
careful as the large planters, and are sometimes guilty of 
planting more than the number agreed upon, while the 
mountain passes towards the table-land are carefully guarded 
to prevent smuggling of the crop, which is far more remu- 
nerative than selling to the government. 

"We will now take the reader to the primitive tobacco 
plantations of America about the middle of the Sixteenth 
Century. The plantations were not located in Cuba as many 
have supposed but what has been variously named Hispanio- 
la, Hayti, and St. Domingo. It was in this island that the 
Spaniards first began the cultivation of tobacco and inaugu- 
rated (under the guise of Christianity) that career of 
monstrous cruelty, with which their insatiable appetite for 
the burning of heretics and for the baiting of bulls so well 
accords. In 1509, Diego Columbus, the eldest son of the great 
discoverer, assumed in St. Domingo, or as it was then called, 



344 EARLY TOBACCO PLANTATIONS. 

Hispaniola, the vice-regal powers which had been intrusted to 
him, Diego as portrayed by the historian " was a man as 
noble as his father, and almost as gifted ; and he had his 
father's fate. Like his father, he had to bear all that Spanish 
envy and Spanish malignity could inflict. In 1511, Diego 
Columbus sent Diego Velasquez to conquer Cuba." From 
historians Velasquez gets a better character than most of the 
Conquistador es^ who in general were as ferocious as they 
were audacious and fortunate. No serious opposition was or 
could be offered. With the name of Velasquez the prosper- 
ity of Cuba is inseparably identified. As Governor of Cuba 
he was a vigorous colonizer and civilizer. He founded 
Havana, which he called the Key of the New World, and 
which is said to rank as the eighth place in the hierarchy of 
commercial cities. Havana, however had long been flourish- 
ing before the seat of Government had been transferred to it 
from Santiago. It was Velasquez who introduced slavery 
into Cuba ; and it was during his vice-royalty and under his 
sanction that those memorable exploratory and conquering 
expeditions began, the most astonishing of which was that to 
Mexico, led by Cortez, the insubordinate lieutenant of Velas- 
quez, whose death is said to have been hastened by the 
rebellious and ungrateful conduct of Cortez, and perhaps by 
the spectacle of such immense and rapid success. The agri- 
cultural, commercial, and general growth of the West India 
islands at this period would have been much more rapid if 
the Spaniards had not annihilated the native population, and 
if they had not been exposed to incessant piratical attacks. 
These were often of the most desolating kind. In 1688, the 
city of Puerto Principe was plundered and destroyed. 
From its strongly fortified position Havana set the bucca- 
neers at defiance, and sometimes saved the whole island from 
ruin. 

The exact period of the first cultivation of tobacco in St. 
Domingo is not known, but we find that as early as 1535 the 
negroes had habituated themselves to the use of it in the 
plantations of their master. Soon however its cultivation 
increased, and during the latter part of the Sixteenth Centufy 



TOBACCO IN ST. DOMINGO. 



345 



the Spaniards shipped vast quantities to Europe, a very large 
amount of which found its way to England, where it brought 
fabulous prices. The Spaniards, by the application of the 
lash and other cruelties, extorted from the negroes an amount 




ST. DOUINGO TOBACCO FIELD, 1535. 

of labor never equaled by any other task masters in the world. 
Forcing these slaves to labor on the plantations from morning 
until night, with the fierce rays of a tropical sun shining full 
upon their uncovered backs, and goaded on to the perform- 
ance of the severest toil, is it any wonder that the haughty 
cavaliers of Spain grew rich from their industry, and feasted 
on the products of the Indies. Cultivated on the rich soil of 
this fertile island, the tobacco of St. Domingo had no com- 
petitor, until the Spaniards began its culture a little later on 
the island of Trinidad, the product of which in time stood at 
the head of all the tobaccos of the Indies and of South 
America. The tobacco trade at this time was wholly con- 
trolled by the Spaniards, who, though successful in this 
direction, made but slow progress in colonization. Compared 
with the British colonies in the New World, the Spanish 
possessions were weak and incompetent, and for all their 
advantages in their great product, it was ultimately rivaled 



346 



CUBAN PLANTATION. 



by the English Colonial tobacco. In the conquest of the 
New World, Spanish energy and enterprise seem to have 
exhausted themselves; and as Spain was declining, its 
colonies could not be expected rapidly to advance. The 
history of the Spanish conquest in America is a record of 
cruelty and of blood, while that of English colonization is 
marked by English rigor and enterprise, and is one of suc- 
cessful daring and ultimate triumph. 

The "West India plantations, however, were still worked, and 
for more than a century St. Domingo yielded a vast amount 
of tobacco, until the soil of Cuba was found to be better 
adapted for its production than any other of the West India 
islands, not excepting even the island of Trinidad. 

Hazard, in his work on Cuba, describes the celebrated yegas 
or tobacco plantations, of the island as follows : 

" The best properties known as vegas, or tobacco farms, 
are comprised in a narrow area in the south-west part of the 
island, about twenty-seven leagues broad. Near the western 
extremity of the Island of Cuba, on the southern coast, is 
found one of the finest tobaccos in the world. "Within a 
space of seventy-three miles long and eighteen miles wide, 
grows the plant that stands as eminent among tobacco plants 




A CUBAN vega. 



as the lordly Johannisberger among the wines of the Rhine. 
Shut in on the north by mountains, and south-west by 



METHOD OF WORKING. 347 

the ocean, Pinar del Rio beiug the principal point in the 
district. These vegas are found generally on the margins of 
rivers, or in low, moist localities, their ordinary size being 
not more than a cohalleria, which amounts to about thirty- 
three acres of our measurement. The half of this is also 
most frequently devoted to the raising of the vegetable known 
as the j!;?a^«no (banana), which may be said to be the bread of 
the lower classes. A few other small vegetables are raised. 
The usual buildings upon such places are a dwelling house, a 
drying-house, a few sheds for cattle, and perhaps a small 
l)ohio (hut),or two, made in the rudest manner, for the shelter 
of the hands, who, upon some of the very largest places 
number twenty or thirty, though not always negroes — for this 
portion of the labor of the island seems to be performed by 
the lower classes of whites. Some of the places that are 
large have a mayoral, as he is called, a man whose business it 
is to look after the negroes, and direct the agricultural 
labors ; but, as a general thing, the planter, who is not 
always the owner of the property, but simply the lessee, lives 
upon, directs, and governs the place. 

" Guided by the results of a long experience transmitted 
from his ancestors (says a Spanish author), the farmer knows, 
without being able to explain himself, the means of augment- 
ing or diminishing the strength or the mildness of the 
tobacco. His right hand, as if guided by an instinct, foresees 
what buds it is necessary to take off in order to put a limit to 
the increase or height, and what amount of trimming is 
necessary to give a chance to the proper quantity of leaves. 
But the principal care, and that which occupies him in his 
waking hours, is the extermination of the voracious insects 
that persecute the plant. One called cachaga domesticates 
itself at the foot of the leaves ; the verde, on the under side 
of the leaves ; the rosguilla, in the heart of the plant ; all of 
them doing more or less damage. The planter passes entire 
nights, provided with lights, clearing the buds just opening, 
of these destructive insects. He has even to carry on a war 
with still worse enemies, — the vivijagnas, a species of large, 
native ants, that are to the tobacco what the locust is to the 
wheat. This plague is so great, at times, that prayers and 
special adoration are offered up to San Marcial to intercede 
against the plague of ants. 

" The plant, whose original name was coMha, seems to have 
been cultivated first by Europeans on the island in the 
vicinity of Havana. The island of Cuba is without doubt 



MS FINANCIAL EMBARRASSMENT. 

well adapted for the cultivation of tobacco — the soil, climate, 
and improved methods of culture all tend to the production 
of a leaf tobacco as celebrated as it is valuable. 

" Between the ' Lower Yalley,' in the Nicotian, not the 




KILLING BUGS BY NIGHT. 



geographical, sense of these words, lie the so-called Partidos 
which produce the tobacco that is sent to Europe as Partido 
or Cabanas. The leaf often surpasses that of the ' Lower 
Valley ' in size and fineness, as well as in the beauty of the 
color; but it is inferior in quality. The tobacco farmers 
though stalwart fellows are not fond of work, and too often 
waste their time at the tavern. Many of them fronci thrift- 
lessness are plunged into debt ; and scarcely is the harvest 
ended when they borrow money from the tobacco merchant 
on the following harvest, who thereby obtains the right to 
interfere, it may be despotically, with the management of 
the crop. Continual embarrassments tempt the tobacco 
planters to be dishonest. To cheat their creditors, they often 
sell the best part of the crop in underhand fashion. Such of 
the tobacco farmers as wish to produce a great deal of tobacco, 
without regard to the excellence of the article, leave the 
plant to its natural growth, which is both scientifically and 
otherwise objectionable, for it is on a process of thinning and 
pruning a due diffusion of sap in the leaves depends, and 
consequently the quality of the tobacco." 



SOIL AND CLIMATE. 349 

The tobacco, after being being baled, is sent to the Havana 
market. The bales of tobacco are carried on the backs of 
mules or horses to the city or to the nearest railway station. 

" In the long line or train of mules or horses, the head of 
one mule or horse is tied to the tail of the one before it. 




GOING TO MARKET. 



On the back of the foremost sits the driver. The hindmost 
carries a bell, which enables the driver to know whether any 
of the animals have broken loose." 

From the description given by Hazard of Cuba, its soil, 
climate, and other resources, it will readily be seen by all 
acquainted with the tobacco plant that this famous island is 
well adapted for the production of a tobacco that for fineness 
and delicacy of flavor is hardly rivaled. "With the peculiar 
composition of the soil, and with a climate well adapted for 
the perfection of all kinds of tropical plants and fruits, it can 
hardly be imagined that any finer variety of tobacco can be 
grown than that produced in Cuba and the adjoining islands. 
Doubtless the climate of Cuba is nearly the same as when 



350 TOBACCO GROWING IN GERMANY. 

Columbus discovered the island, and wrote in such extrava- 
gant language its praise. The soil of Cuba is prolific, and 
the variety of tropical plants and fruits grown upon the 
island is quite remarkable. Nowhere is this seen to a greater 
extent than in the varieties of tobacco cultivated. Although 
there are several kinds and qualities grown on the island, 
the mode of culture upon all the vegas is nearly the same. 
These vegas or tobacco farms greatly outnumber the coffee 
and sugar estates, but are much smaller, and require a less 
number of hands to work them. Hazard estimates the num- 
ber at ten thousand, while they are constantly increasing as 
new fields are being tried and new modes of culture intro- 
duced. Russell says of tobacco culture in Cuba : — 

*•' In regard to climate, it is worthy of observation that 
tobacco is only cultivated during winter, when there is little 
rain. It grows most luxuriantly in summer with the increased 
heat and moisture ; but the leaves grown in this season are 
devoid of those qualities for which the weed is esteemed. 
The conditions of growth are less powerful in winter, when 
the temperature is ten degrees lower, and the fall of rain 
small. At the same time, there is more sunshine to impart 
those aromatic qualities which are so much relished by 
smokers of tobacco. In Yirginia the torrid heat and thunder 
showers during the summer months are by no means favora- 
ble for developing the mild aroma of a good smoking leaf. 
Such atmospheric conditions are better suited for cotton and 
Indian corn than tobacco, which must have dry weather and 
sunshine to produce it in perfection." 

No country in Europe is more celebrated for its tobacco 
than Germany. The tobacco plant has been cultivated in 
some parts of Prussia for nearly two centuries. The tobacco 
of Germany is used for all purposes for which the leaf is 
designed — for cutting, cigars, and snuff. There are various 
kinds of German tobacco, the finest being grown in the Grand 
Duchy of Baden. The native tobacco of Germany, however, 
is not powerful in flavor, and may be smoked continuously 
to an extent which would be dangerous and disagreeable if 
American tobacco were used. Although it is cultivated in 
most of the States of Germany, and by a large number of 
growers, still the tobacco fields as a rule are small. The 



METHOD OF CULTURE. 



351 



Germans are among the most thorough cultivators of the 
plant in Europe, and every operation in the field is done at 
the proper time and in the right manner. After it is cured 
they prepare it nicely in rolls and carots, the latter for man- 
ufacturing into snuff. The tobacco fields are faithfully 
tended, and the utmost pains taken to secure large, well- 
formed leaves. The fields present a much more even appear- 
ance than similar fields in France, where the tobacco grown 
is small and uneven. The South German growers of tobacco 
are without doubt the most successful tobacco-growers in 
Europe, not excepting the Hollanders, who raise an excellent 
tobacco for snuff. The time of gathering the leaves is the 
occasion of quite a merry-making among the growers and 
villagers, and is considered an event of considerable import- 
ance. Fairholt says : — 

" The time of harvesting the leaves is an interesting period 
for a stranger to visit the villages, which put on a new aspect 
as every house and barn is hung all over with the drying 
leaves." 

German tobacco cures well, and some of the finer sorts 
make excellent cigar wrappers and are much esteemed 




GERMAN TOBACCO HELD. 



throughout Europe. The following account of the cultiva- 
tion and production of tobacco in the different German 



352 EXTENT OF CULTURE. 

States, will give some idea of the amount cultivated and used 
in Germany : — 

" The aggregate area of land cultivated vrith tobacco in 
Prussia during the year 1871, amounted to 5.925 hectares (a 
hectare being equal to 2.47 English acres). It appears that 
the extent of tobacco-growing land has, during the last fifty 
years, been gradually diminishing in Prussia, and that accord- 
ingly the expectations entertained in the beginning of that 
period of a great future development of this branch of agri- 
culture, have not been realized : for whilst the area of land 
planted with tobacco in the year 1825 was 12.374 hectares, 
it amounted in 1871 to less than one-half this amount. The 
reasons for this gradual decline are considered to be, on the 
one hand, the growing competition of the South German 
growers, and the increase in the importations of American 
tobacco ; on the other, the fact that the cultivation of beet- 
root (for sugar manufacturing) and of potatoes (for the dis- 
tilleries) has proved to be a more profitable business than the 
cultivation of tobacco. It has, moreover, been found by 
many years' experience, that whilst the quality of the tobacco 
cultivated in most parts of Prussia is not such as to enable 
the growers to compete successfully with the importers of 
foreign (particularly of North American) sorts, the labor 
attending its cultivation and its preparation for the market, 
as well as the uncertainty of only an average crop, are out of 
proportion, as a rule, to the average profits arising therefrom. 
The cultivation of the plant has, consequently, gradually 
become restricted, chiefly to those districts of the country 
where either the soil is peculiarly adapted for the purpose, 
or where it is carried on for the private use of the producer." 

With regard to the various provinces of Prussia, it appears 
that " In East Prussia the extent of tobacco land is only a 
limited one, and is confined to the district around Tilsit, 
where about two-thirds of the entire cultivation is in the 
hands of peasants, who consume their own produce. In 
"West Prussia (the western portion of the province of Prussia 
proper) the cultivation is rather more extensive, particularly 
near the town of Marienwerder ; the tobacco, however, is 
very inferior. The most important districts of the province 
of Posen are those of Chodziesz and Meseritz. In Pomera- 
nia, next to Brandenburg the most important tobacco-grow- 
ing province of the kingdom, the area of land cultivated is 
very large. The principal districts are those near Stettin. 
In Silesia the most important districts are those around 



TOBACCO-RAISING IN PRUSSIA. 353 

Breslau, Ratibor, and Oels. The principal tobacco-growing 
province of Prussia is Brandenburg, and here again, particu- 
larly the part of the government district of Potsdam, which 
contains the towns of Neustadt, Eberswalde and Prenzlau. 
Besides the districts mentioned, tobacco is grown largely in 
that of Frankibrt-on-the Oder. In the province of Saxony 
the chief districts are those of Stendal, Salzwedel, Nordhausen, 
Burg, and Wittenburg. Hanover, like the other western 
proviuc;iS of the kingdom, produces a superior quality of 
tobacco to that raised in the eastern parts of Prussia — the 
most important district is that of Munden. The chief 
tobacco-growing districts of Ilesse-Nossau are situated near 
the towns of Cassel and Hanaii, In Rhenish Prussia the 
plant is cultivated, particularly in the neighborhood of Cleve, 
Emmerich, Coblenz, Creuznach, and Saarbruck ; the dis- 
tricts first mentioned produce a very superior quality. The 
production of tobacco in Westphalia is extremely small, while 
in the province of Schleswig-Holstein the plant is not culti- 
vated at all. In the account given it will be seen that the 
tobacco plant holds an important place among the products 
of Prussia, and although not as extensively cultivated as 
formerly, has not been entirely driven from the soil by other 
products which 3'ield a larger profit to the producer. The 
plant is cultivated in other parts of Germany, especially in 
Bavaria, where large quantities of tobacco are grown, par- 
ticularly so in the Bavarian Palatinate and in Franconia (viz., 
the districts around Nuremberg and Erlangen). In the 
Kingdom of Saxony but little tobacco is raised, as is also the 
case in Wurtemberg, although the soil and climate in parts 
of this state are said to be very favorable to the growth of 
the tobacco plant ; the area of land cultivated is upon the 
whole, a very limited one, and in 1871 did not exceed 178.2 
hectares. The Grand Duchy of Baden has at all times been 
the chief tobacco-growing part of Germany ; as far back as 
the end of the Seventeenth Century, special laws for regula- 
tion of the cultivation, preparation, and warehousing of this 
article were in force. The most prominent tobacco-growing 
districts of Baden are those of Carlsruhe, Mannheim, Heidel- 
burg, Badenburg, Schwetzingen, and Lahr ; the quality of 
the plant grown in those parts being a very superior one 
(among the various kinds of German tobacco). The produce 
of the districts mentioned is therefore applied chiefly in the 
manufacture of cigar wrappers, and is exported in consider- 
able quantities to Bremen, Hamburg, Switzerland, Holland, 
23 



354 TOBACCO IN HOLLAND. 

and even to America for the use of cigar manufacture. The 
prices of the best kinds of Baden tobacco are consequently 
also, on an average, much higher than those realized by other 
German growers. In the Grand Duchy of Hesse the plant 
is cultivated, the chief district being that around the town of 
Darmstadt ; in the Thuringian States, tobacco is grown ; the 
most prominent among them as regards its production is the 
Duchy of Saxe-Meiningen. In Mecklenburg also some 
tobacco is raised, the most important district being that of 
Neu Brandenburg (in Mecklenburg-Strelitz). In Brunswick 
only a small extent of land is used for tobacco growing, 
the same being situated near the town of Helmstadt. In 
Alsace and Lorraine, the recently acquired provinces of 
Germany, the cultivation of tobacco has been extensively 
carried on for many years, more especially in the country 
around Strasburg, Mulhausen, Schirmeck, and Munster, and 
to a small extent near Metz and Thionville." 

It is apparent from this account that the German tobacco 
fields produce a vast quantity of tobacco, some of which is 
of excellent texture and flavor, and well adapted to the taste 
of European smokers of the plant. 

Ever sjnce the introduction of tobacco into Holland, its 
cultivation and its use has been looked upon with favor by 
the " true-born Nederlander," who associates the plant with 
every social enjoyment. The Dutch, on the discovery of 
tobacco, were among the first to use it and encourage its 
cultivation. In the history of the Dutch colonies in the 
Indies it plays an important part. Tobacco began to be 
cultivated in Holland about Amersfoot in 1615, and from 
that time until now, its culture has increased until it has 
become one of the greatest of agricultural products of the 
country. The plant is grown in the Veluive (the valley of 
Guelderland), where the soil is particularly adapted for the 
rich snuff-leaf which is manufactured from Amersfoot tobacco. 
The Dutch, like the Germans, are excellent cultivators of 
tobacco, selecting the richest and the strongest land, and work- 
ing the fields of as fine a tilth as possible. The plants do not 
grow as rapidly as in America, as they are transplanted into 
the fields in May, and are not harvested until the latter part 
of September or beginning of October. The plants attain 



DUTCH PLANTERS. 



35^ 



good size — larger than most of the tobacco of Europe, and a 
tobacco field in Holland compares favorably with any in this 
country. The color of the plants while growing, is a dark 
rich green, and they are of a uniform size, maturing slowly 
but thoroughly. Connor says of Amersfoot tobacco : " This 
tobacco is much esteemed, the fineness of the leaf and its 
freedom from fibres fitting it for cigar-wrappers." 

The Dutch planters of tobacco are among the happiest 
cultivators of the plant in Europe, if not in the world, and 
unlike the renowned Yan Twiller never " have any doubts 
about the matter," and believe that tobacco is absolutely 
necessary to sustain life. After the evening meal the planter 
lights his pipe or calls upon the good dominie, to have a 



J 




m 




fc 


I 








^m 


Sf 




3^*® 




^^^M 


^ 


^^^m 


' t^ /-, 




imM 


^ 






^* 


™ 


1 



DUTCH PLANTERS. 



social chat, discoursing over their favorite beverage the 
virtues of two great luxuries. Oftener, however, he passes 
his evenings at the village inn, where, surrounded by other 
comrades, he discourses as follows of his favorite plant, — 
tabak : 

" That the smoking of tobacco is of infinite benefit, no one 
who is impartial and unprejudiced can deny. In a country 
like Holland, where the atmosphere is always laden with 



356 -A. PLEA FOR TOBACCO. 

heavy and hurtful particles, and where, while people breathe 
that atmosphere from above, they feel themselves not less 
affected from below by the cold, moist, swampy soil — the 
smoking and the chewing of tobacco are the wholesome 
prophylactics of which we can make use. To the Indians 
and the Negroes, tobacco is almost the only solace in this 
transient life. They learn, b}^ means of it, to support nature, 
and to encounter valiantly, by its help, all the tribulations 
incidental to the human lot. If they are depressed, they 
smoke or chew tobacco, and gladden themselves therewith. 
If they are exhausted, and the sun and their hard and inhu- 
man masters appear to conspire to destroy them, a little 
tobacco restores their strength, makes them forget their 
slavish life, and go vigorously to work again. 

In the Thirty Years' War in Germany, tlie smoking and 
chewing of tobacco proved the salvation of many thousands 
of men, who by its aid guarded themselves against the deadly 
effects of deficient food and of bad meats and drinks. Noth- 
ing is so good, nothing so serviceable to human life, as the 
smoking of tobacco — which may well be called a kingly plant, 
seeing that the monarchs of the earth are not ashamed to use 
it. While tobacco cultivates sociality, and is of great avail 
in severe hunger and thirst, it strengthens the body and 
checks fluxions, and colds, and slimy humors. Nature has 
willed it that men should make use of plants like tobacco, 
which, by their heat and sharpness, draw the humors out- 
ward, and cause a slight salivation. Witness, as confirmation 
of what has been said, cloves and pepper, which hold sway 
nearly over the earth ; betel, which to the Hindoos is the 
remedy for every disease ; the onions and leeks of the 
Egyptians, who while building the pyramids and obelisks, 
spent their money eagerly on those dainties ; and tobacco, 
which is adopted by the four quarters of the world. 

The justly celebrated British physician, Cheyne, has 
remarked that both chewing and smoking of tobacco are 
exceedingly serviceable for those who suffer from rheumatic 
and catarrhal affections, have a sluggish digestion, or live a 
luxurious life. As tobacco has numerous slanderers, so there 
are many who know not how to turn tobacco to a good 
purpose. Excess and abuse may be found in the smoking and 
chewing of tobacco as in other things. Instead of using 
tobacco in moderation, there are persons who make themselves 
its slaves, and render themselves incapable of the immense 
benefit of the enlivening and stimulating effect they would 



"THIRSTY TOBACCO." 357 

otherwise owe to it. A little tobacco smoked or chewed 
three or four times a day cannot fail to be beneficial. But 
the adversaries of tobacco, in order to furnish themselves 
with an argument, make tobacco bear all the blame when 
some one who has given himself up to an intemperate and 
luxurious life, and who is besides a great smoker, becomes 
the victim of all kinds of discomforts and sickness. To con- 
demn tobacco by saying those who begin to chew or smoke 
it nearly always suffer from malaise and nausea, is surely 
preposterous. May we not in fairness contend that tobacco 
is essentially wholesome, that it helps digestion, relieves the 
mind and cheers the spirits." 

The following humorous account of " Thirsty Tobacco " 
is a most curious illustration of the superstitions which 
spontaneously grow up in the hearts of the people. 

" Soon after the introduction of tobacco into Holland 
many of the Dutch were of the opinion that the tobacco 
plant drank in moisture greedily and required to be often 
and abundantly watered. From this insatiable thirst the 
belief arose that tobacco was the cause of rain, brought clouds 
to the heavens, and restored the general crojjs. Once, in 
the neighborhood of Amersfoot, the weather was very rainy, 
and the crops suffered accordingly. On the tobacco grow- 
ing round the town the blame of the calamity was thrown ; 
and it was resolved to punish tobacco, the sottish rain-drinker 
and wicked rain-bringer. A rabble, consisting chiefly of 
boys and youths, rushed to the tobacco fields, and scattered 
havoc with the ferocity of stupidity. The mad creatures 
pulled up the stalks, tore off the leaves, and trampled leaves 
and stalks under foot. Before they had done the work of 
destruction quite as completely as they desired, soldiers 
appeared on the scene. They sternly commanded the rioters 
to desist, but the rioters paid no heed either to entreaties or 
threats. Thereupon they drew their swords, as if by the 
mere flash of these to terrify the rioters, who laughed a laugh 
of contempt. Then effectually to frighten the rioters, the 
soldiers fired at them with blank cartridges. This harmless 
noise drove the mischief-makers to ignominious flight, and the 
tobacco plants which were still uninjured were left in peace." 

At what exact time this destruction of " thirsty tobacco " 
took place we are left in doubt. It is doubtless a " good joke " 
got up by some "ponderous joker" for the amusement of 
Dutch smokers. 



358 



HOLLAND AND ITS PEOPLE. 



All admirers of tobacco like Holland and its people. It 
is emphatically the land of smoke. One is constantly in 
cloud-land, and whether in the house or on the street the 
incense of tobacco is perpetual, from the good natured dominie 
who puffs leisurely at many pipes to the humblest peasant 
who works modestly among the plants, all burn the fragrant 
weed and pay homage to its shrine. Ever since the Dutch 
looked upon the plant it has been more to them than king 
and courtier. The old Dutch burgomasters "who dozed 
awav their lives and grew fat upon the bench of magistracy 
in Rotterdam ; and who had comported themselves with such 
singular wisdom and propriety, that they were never either 
heard or talked of, owed all to the use and influence of the 
' kingly plant.' " Not only are the Dutch prodigious smokers, 
but they use the pipe at all places and at all times. On the 
way to Church the pipe is lighted, and after service it is the 
solace of the evening hour. 

In all public places the pipe plays an important part. The 
traveler is constantly reminded of the use of tobacco; for 
even the bridges have public notices affixed to them request- 




SUCCESS TO VON TROMP. 



ing all visitors to prevent the fall of tobacco-ashes on the 
gravel or grass; and not to knock out their pipes within 



TOBACCO CULTURE IN AUSTRALIA. 359 

bounds of the place. The old Dutch planters were fond of a 
" silent pipe," and after the labors of the day gathered 
together to drink and smoke to the success of Admiral Von 
Tromp, whose exploits in the British Channel carried terror 
to many a heart. Or, speculated upon the voyage of the 
" Goede Yrouw''' (Good Woman), which had been fitted out 
to colonize the new country. 

The progress of tobacco-culture in Oceanica, is shown in 
the following account which Connor gives of the tobacco 
plantations of Australia : 

" The development of tobacco culture in AustraHa has been 
great and rapid. In these colonies, where only a few years 
ago the plant was not known, there are now hundreds of 
acres under tobacco. The local manufacture is also keeping 
pace with the production of the leaf, and the import of 
tobacco into the Australian colonies yearly diminishes in 
proportion to the increased consumption of locally grown 
and manufactured tobacco. Imported leaf is used in the 
manufacture of cigars, those made from colonial leaf being 
held in low esteem. Steady efibrts are being made by the 
cultivators to improve the quality of the produce, and with 
every prospect of success, many places in the colonies being 
well adapted for the growth of the plant. Colonel De Coin 
says Australia is capable of producing very good qualities. 
Tobacco has hitherto been grown upon alluvial lands, but a 
preference is evinced for lands somewhat less rich but free 
from floods. Alluvial land gives a larger crop per acre, but 
the flavor is ranker. In 1872 there were 567 acres under 
tobacco in New South Wales. The average produce of the 
colonies is about 1,300 pounds to the acre. The amount of 
produce A'^aried from 976 pounds to the acre in Kew South 
Wales to 2,016 in Tasmania, the climate of this island being 
moister and more favorable for tobacco than that of the other 
colonies. Manilla and Havana tobacco has been grown with 
great success for seed for many years at the Adelaide Botanic 
Gardens, and the seed raised has been largely distributed." 

The Australian growers may demonstrate the fact that as 
good or better Manilla tobacco can be grown by them than in 
the Philippine islands. If the leaf will burn freely, and 
leave a white, firm ash, the product will no doubt prove a 
rival of the leaf grown in Luzon. From the composition of 



360 



ARABIAN TOBACCO. 



the soil, it is hardly probable that Havana tobacco can be 
grown to perfection ; it may, however, resemble in some 
measure the Cuban leaf. The climate has much to do with 
the flavor of tobacco ; more than with the size of the plants 
or the color of the leaf. Cuba in this respect has a decided 
advantage over Australia ; and Havana tobacco will hardly 
find a rival in Australian leaf, though grown on the finest 
soil, and given the most thorough care. 

So extensive is the cultivation of the tobacco plant, that 
even the Arab cultivates it in the burning desert. In Algiers 
it is an important product; and through the efforts and 
encouragement of the French government its cultivation is 
assuming large dimensions. Some portions of Algiers seem 
to be well adapted for tobacco, the finest of which is equal to 




TOBACCO FIELD IN ALGIERS. 



any obtained from America ; but a large portion of the prod- 
uct from that province is of poor quality. It is a favorite 
plant with the Arab, and his attention seems to be about 
equally divided between his tobacco and his camels. The 
plant is light in color and of peculiar flavor, well suited to 
his taste, and in keeping with his idea of quality and excel- 
lence. The crop is usually bountiful, notwithstanding the 
heat of the summer and the absence of moisture in the soil. 



TOBACCO IN AFRICA. 



361 



The tobacco plant is also cultivated in other parts of Africa 
besides Algiers. In Egypt and Nubia it is grown to a con- 
siderable extent, as well as by most of the native tribes of 
the South-west. Among some tribes it forms an important 
article of trade, and serves the purpose of money or its repre- 
sentative. The natives are partial to the plant, and devotedly 
attached to smoking. Little patches may be seen near their 
huts, on which they lavish their attention and care. In some 
parts of Africa tobacco grows to a very great height. Liv- 
ingstone gives an account of a variety that attained an 
altitude much higher than the American plant. Several 
varieties are cultivated, some of them resembling the Shiraz 
and Latakia, while most of it is said to be similar to Virginia 
tobacco, only larger. With careful culture the plant would 

doubtless thrive in 
most parts of Afri- 
ca, as the soil is 
light and the sea- 
son usually favor- 
able. Though the 
heat is extreme the 
plant flourishes 
even in the hottest 
part of the season, 
and attains a de- 
gree of perfection 
corresponding to 
the labor bestowed 
by the natives in 
cultivating. Their manner of curing is simply by drying the 
leaves, and is not suited to the taste of any besides them- 
selves. In Egypt, Algiers, and Nubia, the plant is culti- 
vated with more care, and a better system of curing is 
adopted than by the natives of the interior. Burton gives 
an account of the cultivation of tobacco by the natives of 
East Africa : — 

" Tobacco grows plentifully in the more fertile regions of 




TOBACCO FIELD IN AFRICA. 



362 SYRIAN TOBACCO FIELDS. 

East Africa. Planted at the end of the rains, it gains strength 
by sun and dew, and is harvested in October. It is prepared 
for sale in different forms. Everywhere, however, a simple 
sun-drying supplies the place of cocking and sweating, and 
the people are not so fastidious as to reject the lower or 
coarser leaves and those tainted by the earth. Usumbara 
produces what is considered at Zanzibar a superior article ; it 
IS kneaded into little circular cakes four inches in diameter 
by half an inch deep : rolls of these cakes are neatly packed 
in plantain-leaves for exportation. The next in order of 
excellence is that grown in Uhiao : it is exported in leaf or 
in the form called Jcamhari, roll-tobacco, a circle of coils each 
about an inch in diameter. The people of Khutu and Usa- 
gara mould the pounded and wetted material into discs like 
cheeses, 8 or 9 inches across by 2 or 3 in depth, and weigh- 
ing about 3 lbs.; they supply the Wagogo with tobacco, 
taking in exchange for it salt. The leaf in Unyamwezi gen- 
erally is soft and perishable, that of Usukuraa being the 
worst ; it is sold in blunt cones, so shaped by the mortars in 
which they are pounded. At Karaguah, according to the 
Arabs, the tobacco, a superior variety, tastes like musk in 
the water-pipe. The produce of Ujiji is better than that of 
Unyamwezi ; it is sold in leaf, and is called by the Arabs 
haimimi^ after a well-known growth in Hazramaut. It is 
impossible to give an average price to tobacco in East Africa ; 
it varies from 1 khete of coral beads per 6 oz. to 2 lbs." 

Some of the most beautiful and fragrant tobacco fields in 
the world are to be found in Syria. Indeed it may truthfully 
be said that a field of Latakia tobacco is hardly inferior in 
beauty to the large and fragrant orchards of the olive and 
mulberry, or the wheat fields on the terraced sides of Mount 
Lebanon. 

The tobacco plant is cultivated in various parts of Syria 
and particularly by the Druses on " The Lebanon," as it is 
usually called. 

The cultivation of tobacco in Syria, has been a consider- 
able industry, and the product has acquired a reputation in 
European markets that has demonstrated its real value, and 
a constant demand for this variety of the plant. Latakia 
tobacco resembles in flavor the yellow tobacco of Eastern 
Thibet and Western China, both of them grown from the 



LATAKIA TOBACCO. 363 

same seed. Latakia tobacco is not sweated like most tobacco, 
but is first cured in the sun and then hung up in the peasants' 
huts to cure until ready for market. The plants ripen very 
fast and emit an aromatic odor, increasing in strength as the 
plants ripen. For smoking it has but few superiors. After 
curing, it is baled and sent to Europe, where it is manu- 




TOBACCO FIELD IN SYEIA. 



factured into smoking tobacco. The plants are well cultivated 
and watched against the ravages of birds, which seem to like 
the young and tender plants especially before they are trans- 
planted. From the nature of the soil the plants are watered 
frequently, and when the leaves are about the size of a large 
cabbage leaf are ready to harvest. As the plants ripen 
the leaves gradually thicken and take on a lighter shade ; 
the leaf when green is very thick, but after curing is quite 
thin and of a bright yellow or brown, according to the pro- 
cess employed in curing. The peasants take equal pains in 
its fumigation, using various kinds of wood according to the 
color of leaf they wish to obtain. They usually make two 
kinds of leaf, the finest being colored brown and known by 
the name of dbowri. The tobacco is fumigated with two 
kinds of wood, gozen (pine wood) and sindian (oak), thfe 
tobacco fumigated with gozen having the best smell. The 
fumigation, however, is said not to be resorted to expressly 



364 THE FUTURE. 

for the tobacco, but the mountaineers of necessity burn much 
wood in their huts in the winter, and the smoke improves 
the tobacco in color, smell, and flavor. All the tobacco grown 
about Latakia derives its origin from the same seed, but the 
difference between the cibowri and the other kinds is owing 
to the cultivation of the former about high mountains and 
with the use of pine wood in fumigating it. A field of Lata- 
kia tobacco presents a novel appearance, the short straight 
plants with their ovate leaves bearing yellow blossoms form 
a striking contrast to towering seed leaf rising fully two or 
three feet higher than the Syrian plant. 

Fairholt says that " Latakia tobacco is a native of America 
but grows wild in other countries, and is a hardy annual in 
English gardens, flowering from midsummer to Michaelmas, 
so that by some botanists it has been termed ' common, or 
*■ English tobacco.' " Burton's work on unexplored Syria is 
full of passages relating to tobacco and the custom of smoking. 

" The tobacco which is grown on the slopes of the Libanus 
and the Anti-Libanus mountains appears to be one of the 
finest quality and most delicate flavor. The monks of the 
convents are famous for the production of a snuff, which for 
pungency, at least, is far superior to the snuffs of Europe. 
Personal experience of it convinces us that a great deal of, 
the pungency of this snuff is due to the addition of some 
aromatic herb in addition to the natural acridity produced 
by the highly dried tobacco. The cultivation of tobacco in 
Syria, will probably increase in proportion to the improved 
condition of affairs in Syria, we have little doubt ; and we 
trust that when agricultural science is better studied there, 
Englishmen will have the opportunity of testing the value 
and importance of Syrian tobacco products." 

Conoor says of the tobacco fields of India : — 

" In the Bombay Presidency tobacco is largely produced, 
and its quality in such districts as Kaira and Khandesh is 
superior. In 1871 there were nearly 43,000 acres of land 
under tobacco in the presidency, the largest quantities being 
grown in Kaira, Khandesh, Belgaum Sattara, Shalopoor, and 
Poena. The trade is extensive. The exports of tobacco 
to foreign countries amount to several million pounds 
annually. Among foreign countries, Mauritius, Bourbon, 



GROWING TOBACCO IN INDIA. 



365 



and neighboring places, not reckoned as part of British 
India, take a large share of the exports. Bombay exports 
tobacco to other Indian presidencies. Small quantities of 
the fine Guzerat tobaccos find their way by rail into 
the North-western Provinces. Niimerons endeavors have 
for many years j)ast been made to improve the quality 
of Bombay tobacco. In 1831 the Kesident in the Persian 
Gulf sent to the local Government a maund of seed of the 
' very finest tobacco grown in Persia,' and with it he sent 
some observations on the mode of cultivating tobacco in the 
neighborhood of Shiraz. In 18t)7 fifteen small packets of 
genuine Shiraz tobacco were forwarded for trial in the Bom- 
bay Presidency. Of the seed sown in Kolhopoor, about eight 
or nine germinated, and the plants grew to a height of five 
feet two inches ; of these only four survived. There were 
two varieties, one with oblong the other with circular leaves. 
Of the seeds sent to Kandesh, only a few germinated. 
All the seed put down in the Victoria Gardens failed. 
That sent to Sind, though said to have been carefully 
Bown, also failed to germinate. The Conservator of Forests 
had the seeds sent him sown in beds, and the plants, when a 
few inches in height, were transplanted into pots. They 
grew with the greatest luxuriance, and produced abundance 

of flowers and 
seed. Some of 
the seed was 
sent to the col- 
lector of Kaira, 
who forwarded 
a sample of the 
tobacco grown 
from it. The 
Conservator con- 
sidered the prod- 
uce very good, 
and the secre- 
tary of the Agri- 
Horticul tural 
Socio ty pro- 
nounced it ' of a 
superior kind.' 
The flavor was 
exceedingly fine, but it had not been allowed to come to matu- 
rity, hence it was thin and shriveled. It had also been spoilt 




TOBACCO FIELD IN INDIA. 



366 DISTRIBUTING SEED. 

by rain, and consequently its market value could not be fairly 
tested. The experiment, it is clear, was not conducted with 
proper care by mosfe of those to whom the seed was confided, 
but the Local Government considered that on the whole the 
result was satisfactory, as showing that there was every 
probability that Shiraz tobacco, with care and proper garden- 
ing, might be introduced into the Bombay Presidency. 

" In August, 1869, the Bombay Government again distrib- 
uted a small supply of seed of the Shiraz, Havana, and other 
varieties to the superintendents of cotton experiments, and 
to the collectors of Kaira, Khandesh, Dharwar, and Kurrachee, 
for experimental cultivation. The seeds did well in the hands 
of all the superintendents, who reported very favorably on 
the plants raised from them. In Sind only the soil in which 
the seed was sown proved unsuitable. In Dharwar all the 
five varieties germinated, though the Maryland failed to some 
extent, and a considerable quantity of seed of each variety 
was secured. Of Latakia, only twenty grains were sent to 
the superintendent ; and the quantity in each case increased 
to one pound from the produce of the plants. These two 
varieties of tobacco, however, were not so much admired by 
the cultivators as Shiraz, Havana, and Maryland, to which 
they gave a decided preference. The only varieties of seed 
which were available for experiments at Broach and Yeerm- 
gaum were Havana and Shiraz. In both places the plants 
came up well, and a large quantity of seed was obtained from 
them. That sent to Broach arrived a little too late in the 
season to admit of an extensive experiment being made ; this 
indeed appears to have been the case at all the other places. 
The seed, however, was of good quality, germinated freely, 
and produced excellent plants in a very short time. 

" The first transplanting was made out into a field in an 
open piece of land, where they commenced growing vigor- 
ously, but the rains being then over, swarms of small locusts 
made their appearance, and ate up the young plants before 
they had thoroughly established themselves in the ground. 
The second lot was transplanted into a more sheltered patch, 
where the progress was all that could be desired, both the 
varieties growing rapidly, the Havana especially producing 
some leaves of enormous size. The first cutting was entrusted 
to a potel, who managed it according to the native process of 
curing. The tobacco was so strong, however, that only old 
confirmed smokers could manage it. The most formidable diffi- 
culty which presented itself was the management of the midrib, 



CURING TOBACCO IN INDIA. 367 

which in the large leaves was extremely coarse and juicy. 
When the leaves were made up into hands for the purpose 
of fermentation before the midrib was thoroughly dry, the 
result was invariably mould and discoloration. On the other 
hand, when dried sufficiently to insure freedom from mould, 
the lamina of the leaf became so brittle that it was crushed 
to powder at the slightest touch, and so wrinkled and dry- 
that the heaps did not ferment at all. Of the varieties sup- 
plied, the Shiraz, Havana, and Maryland attracted most 
attention and promised the best results. The great draw- 
back was the curing part of the process. So far as the culti- 
vation was concerned, there was every prospect of success ; 
but not so with regard to the curing." 

Robertson says of the curing of the leaf: — 

" In my opinion, all efforts to produce good tobacco will 
be useless until the services of a competent curer are 
obtained." 

He considers the fault of all Indian tobacco to lie in the 
curing. The leaf itself is good, and it is simply the art of 
curing that should be studied. 

" I have cured tobacco of different varieties, some of which 
would liold a good place in the English market, but the fault 
generally found with the tobacco is that it is too full flavored. 
Further experiments were carried on in the same districts 
with varying results. In Sind the experiments and their 
results were insignificant. In Broach they were somewhat 
more successful, the superintendent thus summarising his 
experience : — ' Havana, Shiraz, and other varieties of exotic 
tobacco will, with ordinary care and attention, yield fair and 
certain crops on ordinary black land, and presumably on 
every other kind to be met with in Guzerat. By the skillful 
application of manure, leaf of any desired quality or pecul- 
iarity of flavor and texture may be obtained. The quantity 
of produce is so great that, should it be found practicable to 
cure the leaf well enough to make it a salable article in the 
European market, a source of profit by no means insignificant 
would be opened up to the Guzerat ryot. For the native 
market the country plant is more suitable, and its cultivation 
consequently the more profitable.' In Dharwar the super- 
intendent was enabled to distribute seed in sufficient quanti- 
ties to those applying for it, but found the ryots would not 
cultivate it on a large scale, being apprehensive of loss. 
Native tobacco he considers less liable to injury than the 



368 QUALITY OF INDIAN TOBACCO. 

exotic varieties during the squally weather prevalent about 
the time the leaf is approaching maturity." 

Robertson, in replying to the assertion that the tobacco of 
India contains little if any nicotine, says: 

" It appears to me that there must be some mistake as to 
the tobacco containing little or no nicotine. Very many have 
tried the tobacco, and pronounce it to be good, with, however, 
the fault of being exceedingly strong. Now, the strength of 
tobacco comes from its nicotine, and if the specimens I sent 
contain no nicotine, whence the strength ? I believe that 
nothing destroys tobacco so much as moistening it. How, 
then, are acetic acid and chloride of soda to be used in the 
curing ? If the process of desiccation had been carried on 
too quicMy, the tobacco would have been of either a green or 
greenish-yellow color. If too slowly, it would have been 
black, like much of the country tobacco. I jDcrceive that the 
amount of nicotine in a great measure depends on tlie extent 
to which the leaf is allowed to ripen. The riper the leaf the 
more the nicotine. The amount of nicotine does not appear 
to depend on the amount of curing. The soil the tobacco 
was grown in is a hardish red moorum soil, containing much 
iron ; probably that may account for the red coloring matter 
being so much developed. 1 intend to have some of each 
description of the tobacco leaf analyzed, and also intend to 
submit the soil in which it was grown to the same process. 
I have had some of the cigars packed up for some months to 
test how far they are proof against insects. None have been 
attacked by insects. Some Manilla cigars, some Trichinopoly 
cheroots, all packed up at the same time, have, however, been 
entirely destroyed by insects. 

" It is clear from the reports that both in Guzerat and 
Khandesh, Havana and Shiraz tobacco will flourish, and that 
they may be introduced without difliculty. The ryots, it is 
said, preferred the new kinds to their own, and desire their 
introduction, the foreign varieties commanding a higher 
price in the market. The chief drawback is the want of 
knowledge and appliances for the proper curing of the leaf. 
This, indeed, is the great drawback throughout India, In 
the district of Kaira the seed is always sown in nursery beds 
in the month of July, and transplanting commences about 
the end of August, the operation continuing for about two 
months. The tobacco planted on the dry soil called ' koor- 
mit ' ripens and is lit for cutting in January and February ; 
that which is grown on irrigated land during March and 



TURKS CULTIVATING TOBACCO. 369 

April. In Canara, tobacco is generally grown in elevated 
situations. The seed is sown in August, and the seedlings 
are transplanted in November, the crop arriving at maturity 
in three or four months. North Canara derives its supply 
chiefly from Mysore, the leaf produced in that province being 
said to be less liable to affect the head than that of the 
Canara plant." 

The Turk and his family love to cultivate tobacco as well 
as to smoke it ; and give it their attention from seed-sowing 
until it is sold to the merchant. The Turk is very particular 
in cultivating it, as on its color depends in a great measure 
its value. He commences work on his plant-bed in March, 
sowing the seed about the same time as the Virginia planters. 
After the leaves are gathered the same scrupulous care is 
taken with them ; especially in drying and baling, that the 
leaf may be in just the right condition to ferment properly, 
and be ready to be assorted by the " tobacco pickers." The 
Turk presses his whole family into the cultivation of the 
plants. The children are engaged in weeding while he 
waters the beds or prepares the tobacco field for the planting 
of the tobacco. In pruning and picking the leaves he 
removes only those that are small — the removal of which will 
still further advance the growth of the plants, and is careful 
to gather only those leaves that are turning yellow, giving 
evidence of their maturity. Says one in regard to the culti- 
vation of tobacco in Turkey : 

" The Turk and his family, it will seem, have now been 
occupied upon their tobacco crop for nearly a whole year. 
The leaf is just becoming a bright light yellow when it falls 
into the hands of the merchant, and it is during this period 
that the process of fermentation or heating generally occurs, 
before which the tobacco can not be shipped. The bales 
having been placed in the merchant's store, are left end up 
until a fermentation or baking has taken place, the ends being 
reversed every three or four days. In the course of a few 
weeks a bale is reduced to about two-thirds of its original 
size. It is then placed upon its sides to cool. When it is 
discovered to be cold it is broken open by the native tobacco- 
pickers, and every leaf sorted and classified. The patience 
"with which this operation is carried out is truly astonishing. 
24 



370 



PREPARING FOR MARKET. 



There is a good deal of difference in their rate of work. One 
man may pick only fifty pounds weight a day, while another 
does twice that quantity. It is necessary to watch them 
closely, or they will put a dirty brown leaf with a pale 
yellow. They neither know nor care about the losses that 
may be incurred by the merchant, whose samples may be thus 
spoiled. A bale of leaf purchased at five piastres per oque^ 
when dissected by the Greek for various markets will be 
found to contain varieties ranging in price from 5 to 60 
piastres ; of these some are dispatched to Odessa, some to 
Smyrna, others to Constantinople, Alexandria, and England 
— the mixed and common qualities generally to the latter 
country, the price there obtained being the least remunerative 




TURKISH TOBACCO GOING TO MARKET. 



to the Greek shippers. The bales are brought from the 
interior to the shipping ports upon mules, each animal carry- 
ing two bales ; and it is a pretty sight to witness, say 150 
mules at a time, crossing mountains and rugged paths with 
their burdens, followed by perhaps fifty camels laden with 
cotton, marching to the merry tinkle of the bells on their 
necks. When the tobacco reaches the shipping port the 
troubles of the exporter are intensified. The bales are first 
taken to the Custom House, and there weighed. The weights 
thus arrived at are compared with the quantity received from 
the interior, and if there be any material difference the ship- 
per has to account for it. If any has been sold for consump- 
tion in Turkey, duty has to be paid upon the amount ; and 
in order that no part of his shipment may be used in the 
country, he has to sign a bond that the tobacco shall not be 
landed in any other port of Turkey. On the arrival of 



JAPANESE TOBACCO. 



371 



the tol)aceo in England, the landing certiiicates are forwarded 
to Turkey. It is in this way that the trade is retained in the 
hands of a few Greeks, who naturally put every obstacle in 
the way of the foreigner, whose sole remedy is at last found 
to be the payment of the universal 'backshish,' to the 
comptroller of customs." 

The merchant who buys the tobacco of the planter at a 
low price, and thereby takes the profit from him of culti- 
vating it, is preyed upon in the same manner by the Greek 
buyers who have the sole monopoly of the trade. Like Shiraz 
tobacco, that of Turkey has to be handled frequently and 
pass through several stages of curing before it is ready to be 
manufactured. In this respect it is unlike most of the 
tobaccos of America, but its treatment is not unlike that of 
the varieties of the East. 

The tobacco plant is cultivated with great success in many 
of the provinces of Japan, and is exported in large quantities 
_^,^.^^ to Europe. The leaf 

is excellent, and is 
in request by many 
buyers of Eastern 
tobaccos. Robertson 
gives the following 
interesting account 
of the Japan tobacco 
fields : — 

"According to a 
account, to- 



^dlj^'^-^ bacco was introduced 

^^•- into Japan in the 

year 1605, and was 




JAPAN TOBACCO FIELD. 



first planted at Nag- 
asaki in Hizen. It 
is now very generally grown throughout the country. In 
the province of Awa, where a great deal of tobacco is grown, 
the seed is sown in early spring in fields well exposed to the 
Bun and duly prepared for its reception. Well sifted stable 
manure is strewn over the field, and the seedlings appear after 
the lapse of about twenty days. The old manure is then 
swept away, and liquid manure applied from time to time. 



372 CULTURE OF THE PLANT. 

If the plants are too dense they are thinned out. The larger 
plants are now planted out into fields well prepared for the 
purpose in rows, with about eight inches space between each 
plant, the furrows between each row being about two feet 




TRANSPLANTING. 

wide. They are again well sprinkled with liquid manure, 
also with the lees of oil at intervals of about seven days. A 
covering of wheat or millet bran is now laid over the fur- 
rows. The bitter taste of the leaf is in a measure an efiectual 
safeguard against the ravages of insects, but the leaves are 
nevertheless carefully tended to prevent damage from such 
cause. If the reproduction from seed is not desired the 
flowers should be cut off and the stem pruned down, other- 
wise the leaves will lose in scent and flavor. In Osumi 
exceptional attention is paid to the cultivation of the tobacco 
plant. The lees of oil, if liberally used, and stable manure 
sparsely applied, have great effect on the plant, producing a 
small leaf with an excellent flavor ; while, if the opposite 
course is followed, the leaves grow to an immense size, but 
are inferior in taste. 

" When the flowers are in full bloom the ' sand ' leaves are 
picked. After the lapse of twelve or fourteen days the leaves 
are gathered by twos. Any leaves that may remain are 
afterwards broken off along with the stalk. Any sand adher- 
ing to the leaves is removed with a brush ; the stems having 
been cut off, the leaves are rolled round, flrmly pressed down 
with a thin board, and cut exactly in the centre. The two 
halves are then placed one on the top of the other in such 
manner that the edges exactly correspond, and being in this 
position firmly compressed between two boards, they are cut 
into fine strips, the degree of fineness depending on the skill 



GATHERING THE CROP. 



373 



of the cutter. A machine made of hard wood, but with the 
vital parts of iron, is used by some persons for this purpose. 
The machine was devised about sixty years ago by a skillful 
Yeddo mechanic, the idea being taken from those used in 
Osaka and Kiyoto for cutting thread used for weaving into 
silk embroidery. Since then numerous improvements have 
been made in it, and it is now extremely well adapted for the 
economization of labor. Another machine was invented 
about eight years since, also by a Yeddo mechanic. It is 
smaller than the first mentioned, but being very easily worked 
is much in use. Tobacco is sometimes cut in the following 
crude manner : — The leaves are piled one on top of the other, 
tightly compressed into the consistency of a board, and then 
cut into shavings by a carpenter's plane. This is, however, 




CHINESE TOBACCO FIELD. 

about the worst method, and even the best tobacco, if treated 
in such fashion, loses its flavor and valuable qualities." 
In China * tobacco is cultivated in the western part of the 

• I »aw also great plantations of tobacco, which they call tharr, and which yield verr 
considerable profit, as It is universally ugea in smoking, by persons of all ranks, of both 
sexes in China; and, besides great quantities are sent to the MongoUs, who prefer the 
Chinese manner of preparing it before any other. They make it into a gross powder, like 
saw-dnst, which they keep in a small bag, and fill their little brass pipes out of it, without 
touching the tobacco with their Bngera— Bell's TYavels in Asia, 1716, 1719, 1722. 



374 



PERSIAN TOBACCO. 



empire, and grows almost as large as most American varieties* 
Chinese tobacco is usually light in color, of a thin, silky text- 
ure, and mixed with Turkey tobacco, is a considerable feature 
in the export trade of that country. The Chinese cultivate 
the plant like the Japanese, and give it as much care and 
attention as they do the tea plant. The leaves are gathered 
when ripe, and are dried and well-assorted before baling. 
The Chinese planter often raises large fields of the plants, 
and employs many hands to tend and cultivate them. We 
give a cut of a tobacco field and the planter looking at the 
field and noting the progress of the laborers. 

In Persia tobacco is cultivated near Shiraz, which gives 
name to the variety. The soil is very fertile and richly 
cultivated. Not only does the tobacco plant flourish finely, 
but all kinds of vegetables grow to perfection. The Persians 
cultivate the plant principally for their own use. It is a fine 
smoking tobacco, and when cured properly is said to be equal 
to Latakia. Their mode of curing is unlike that adopted by 
any other cultivators of the weed but is very successful, and 
is no doubt the proper method of preparing the leaves for 
use. Their mode of pressing in large cakes is unlike that of 




TOBACCO FIELD IN PERSIA. 



any other growers — but doubtless adds to the aromatic quality 
of the leaf which makes it so popular in the East. 

The tobacco field is trenched so as to retain water, while 



MANILLA TOBACCO. 375 

the plants are set on the ridges where they flourish and 
mature until the buds and flowers are broken off. The har- 
vest occurs in the autumn, when the singular process of 
curing begins. 

Abbott says of the culture and commerce of tobacco in 
Persia : 

" Jehrum, South Persia, is the principal mart for tobacco, 
which is brought here from all the surrounding districts, and 
disposed of to traders, who distribute it over the country far 
and near. These traders are numerous, and many established 
here are wealthy ; they usually transact their business in their 
private houses, without resorting to the caravansaries of 
which there are six in the place. There are many grades 
and qualities of Shiraz tobacco but that produced at Tuffres 
(according to Forster), a town about one hundred miles to 
the south-west of Turshish, is esteemed the best in Persia. 

" Of the many varieties of the tobacco plant grown in the 
East, that known as Manilla is among the most famous and the 
most extensively cultivated. It is grown in several of the Phil- 
ippine islands, particularly in Luzon and the southern group, 
known as the Visayos. The Philippines are a large group of 
islands in the North Pacific Ocean, discovered by Magellan 
in 1521 ; they were afterwards taken posession of by the 
Spaniards, in the reign of Philip II., from whom they take 
their name. 

" The islands are said to be eleven hundred in number, but 
some hundreds of them are very small, and all are nominally 
subject to the Spanish government at Manilla. The Philip- 
pines produce a great variety of tropical products such as 
rice, coffee, sugar, indigo, tobacco, cotton, cacao, abaca, or vege- 
table silk, pepper, gums, cocoa-nuts, dye-woods, timber of all 
descriptions for furniture and the buildings, rattans of various 
kinds, and all the agreeable fruits of the tropics. On the 
shores are found nacre, or mother of pearl, magnificent pearls, 
bird's-nests, shells of every description, an incredible quan- 
tity of excellent fish, and the trepang, or ialate^ a sea-worm, 
or animal substance, found on the shores of the Philippine 
Islands, resembling a large pudding. The Chinese esteem it 
as a great delicacy and mix it with fowl and vegetables. 
The inhabitants practise various kinds of industry; they 
weave matting of extraordinary fineness and of the brightest 
colors, straw hats, cigar cases and brackets ; they manufacture 
cloth and tissues of every sort from cotton, silk, and abaca ; 



376 TOBACCO CULTURE, PHILIPPINE ISLANDS. 

they, from filaments taken from the leaves of the etuana^ 
make cambric of a texture much finer than that of France ; 
and they also manufacture coarse strong cloth for sails, and 
ropes and cables of all dimensions ; they tan and dress leather 
and skins to perfection ; they manufacture coarse earthen 
ware, and forge and polish arms of various kinds ; they build 
ships of heavy tonnage, and also light and neat boats ; and at 
Manilla they frame and finish-off beautiful carriages ; they 
are also very clever workers in gold, silver, and copper; and 
the Indian women are specially expert in needlework, and in 
all kinds of embroidery. 

" The island of Luzon is the largest of the Philippines, and 
extends from north to south for the length of about six 
degrees. It is divided throughout its whole extent by a 
chain of mountains, which in general owe their formation to 
volcanic eruptions. In the provinces of Laguna and Batan- 
gas there is the high mountain called Maijai, one of the lofti- 
est in Luzon, which is beyond doubt an ancient crater ; on 
the summit a little lake is found, the depth of which cannot 
be measured. At some period the lava that then flowed 
from the summit towards the base, in the neighborhood of the 
town of Nacarlan, covered up immense cavities, which are 
now recognizable by the sonorous noise of the ground for a 
great extent ; and sometimes it happens that, in consequence 
of an inundation or an earthquake, this volcanic crust is in 
some places broken, and exposes to the view enormous 
caverns, which the Indians call ' the mouths of hell.' In the 
district about the town of San Pablo, which is situated on 
the mountain, are found great numbers of little circular lakes 
and immense heaps of rotten stones, basalt, and different 
descriptions of lava, which show that all these lakes are 
nothing else than the craters of old volcanoes. Altogether 
the soil to the southward, in the province of Albai, is com- 
pletely volcanic, and the frequent eruptions of the volcano 
bearing that name may, as the natives say, be attributed to 
the same cause as the earthquakes so often felt in the island 
of Luzon. Over almost the whole of these mountains, where 
fire has played so conspicuous a part, there is a great depth 
of vegetable earth, and they are covered with a most splendid 
vegetation. Their declivities nourish immense forests and 
fine pastures in which grow gigantic trees — palm trees, rat- 
tans, and lianas of a thousand kinds, or gramineous plants 
of various sorts, particularly the wild sugar cane, which rises 
to the height of from nine to twelve feet from the ground ; 



CLIMATE OF THE ISLANDS. 



377 



in their interior are rich mines of copper, gold, iron, and coal. 
" There are two distinct and strongly marked seasons in 
the island of Luzon, namely, the rainy or the wintry season, 
and the dry or summer season. For six months of the year 
— that is from June to December — the wind blows from the 
south-west to the north-east, and then the declivities of the 
mountains and all the western side of the island are in the 
season of the rains ; in the six other months, the wind changes, 




GROWING TOBACCO ON THK PHILIPPINK ISLANDS. 

and blows from the north-east to the south-west, when all 
the eastern parts of the island have the season of winter. 
During the rainy season, the incessant fall of rain on the 
mountains causes the rivers, both large and small, to over- 
flow and to become torrents, that rush down upon the plains, 
covering them with water, and depositing the broken earth 
and slime which they have gathered in their course. In the 
dry season, water is supplied for irrigation from reservoirs, 
which are carefully filled during the rains. From these 
causes it follows that without any manuring, and with scarcely 
any improvement from human industry, the soil of the 
Philippines is as fertile as .any in the world ; so that, without 
great labor, the cultivator has most abundant harvests." 

The above description of the Philippines by Gironiere 
gives a faithful account of the vast resources of the islands. 
Of the products cultivated rice and tobacco are the most 
important. The finest tobacco plantations are situated in the 
northern parts of the island of Luzon, and furnish the finest 



378 CULTIVATION. 

quality of Manilla tobacco. That grown in the Visayos is of 
an inferior quality, and is sold to merchants holding a permit 
to purchase at the shipping ports and transport to Manilla for 
sale to the government. In the island of Luzon, the greatest 
quantity of tobacco is cultivated in the provinces of Nueva 
Ecija and Cagavan. 

Tomlinson in an account of the tobacco of the Philippines 
says : " Manilla leaf comes from the three principal districts 
of the island of Luzon — Yisayos, Ygarotes and Cagayan," 
The mode of cultivation does not differ in any great respect 
from that followed in other parts of the world. Great seed 
beds are made on the plantations where the plants are grown 
until ready to transplant in the tobacco ground. Unlike 
most land adapted for tobacco, large crops are grown without 
the aid of any fertilizer whatever. In cultivating the plants, 
buffaloes are used, yoked one after the other, going between 
the rows several times, and at the last ploughing leaving a 
trench in the middle of the rows, for letting off the water. 
The Indian plow used in cultivating is exceedingly simple : 
it is composed of four pieces of wood which the most unhandy 




TOBACCO PLOW. 



ploughman can put together, with the mould board and share, 
which are of cast iron. The lightness and simplicity of this 
plough render it easy to be used in every kind of cultivation, 
where the plantations are divided into rows, such as those of 
tobacco, maize and sugar cane. It is used with great advan- 
tage, not only for cutting down weeds, but also for giving to 
€ach row a ploughing, which is serviceable to the plantation, 



CURING THE CROP. 379 

and which is less costly and quicker than simple weeding 
with the mattock. 

When the leaves are ripe they are stripped from the stalks 
and separated into three classes, according to their size, and 
afterwards made into bunches of fifty or a hundred, by 
passing through them, near the foot, a little bamboo cane, as 
if it was a skewer, by which the bunches are afterwards 
hung up to dry in vast sheds, into which the sun's rays 
cannot enter, but in which the air circulates freely ; they are 
left to hang there until they become quite dry, and for this, 
a greater or less time is required, according to the state of 
the weather. When the drying is effected the leaves are 
placed according to their quality, in bales of twenty-five 
pounds, and in that state they are handed over to the adminis- 
tration of the monopol3\ Gironiere in describing the mode 
of culture on the tobacco plantations says : 

" During the first two months after the transplanting it is 
indispensably necessary to give four ploughings to the ground 
between the rows of the plants, and every fifteen days to 
handpick, or even better, to root out with the mattock, all 
the weeds which cannot be touched by the plough. These 
four ploughings ought to be done in such a manner as to 
leave alternately a furrow in the middle of each line, and on 
the sides, and consequently, at the last ploughing, the earth 
covers the plants up to their first leaves, leaving a trench for 
carrying off all water that may accumulate during the heavy 
rains. As soon as each plant has gained a proper height, its 
head is lopped off to force the sap to turn into the leaves, and, 
in a few weeks afterwards, it is fit for being gathered." 

The tobacco fields or plantations are very large, and 
together with the vast sheds for curing, the fields present a 
beautiful appearance ; the long straight rows with their dark 
green leaves adding not a little to the beauty and variety of 
the landscape. The great growers of the plant are very 
careful in cultivating the fields and give the tobacco frequent 
hoeings, until ready to be gathered and taken to the sheds. 
The planters are obliged to take the utmost pains, as the 
product is obliged to be given up to the monopolizing gov- 
ernment which is the sole purchaser, and which, in its great 



380 



FRAGRANT MANILLAS. 



establishment at Binondoc, employs continually from 15,000 
to 20,000 workmen and workwomen in manufacturing cigars 
for the consumption of the country and for exportation. 

Manilla tobacco is much esteemed in the islands both by 
the Spaniards and the Chinese. The custom of smoking is 
universal among all classes and at all times. In the house, 
on the road and street, the aroma of a fragrant Manilla is 
ever borne on the breeze. The Spaniards are the principal 
owners of the tobacco fields, and, like their brother planters 
on the island of Cuba, are fond of the weed and its more 
potent companion. After a luxurious breakfast the planter 







1 


H 






1 






^ 


SM 








■ 


H 


^&K 


w^m 


m 


f 


1 


1 




E 




i 


^H 


^5^^H^ 


i 


i 


8 




■ 


^9 






1 


■ 




1 


s 






1 


1 



SPANISH PLANTERS. 



elevates his feet for a quiet smoke, and lights either a cigar 
or cheroot, filling the room with smoke and with the most 
fragrant perfume. 

Of all the various products cultivated, but few vie with the 
tobacco plant in beauty of form and general appearance. 
By its greaV variety of colors in leaves and flowers, it ofiers a 
striking contrast with the more sombre hues of most other 



TROPICAL TOBACCO. 381 

plants. When left to grow until the plants have reached 
full size, the tobacco field has the appearance of a vast flower 
garden, the tiny blossoms exhaling their fragrance and the 
entire plant emitting odors as rare and as delicate as the most 
fragrant exotic. In the tropics the finest tobacco plantations 
are found, as nature is more lavish, not only in the richness 
of the soil, but in the variety of the vegetable products. 
Here the tobacco plant attains its finest form and most deli- 
cately flavored leaves. The hues of the flowers are brighter 
and their fragrance sweeter. In the tropics the tobacco field 
may be scented from afar, as its odors are wafted on the 
breeze. In its native home it flourishes and matures as 
readily as the more common kinds of vegetation, while it 
affords th« planter a larger revenue than many of the more 
useful of nature's products. 




CHAPTER XI. 

VARIETIES. 

"HE tobacco plant almost vies with tlie palm in the 
number of varieties ; botanists having enumerated as 
many as forty, which by no means includes the entire 
number now being cultivated. The plant shows also 
a great variety of forms, leaves, color of flowers, and texture. 
Each kind has some peculiar feature or quality not found in 
another ; thus, one variety will have large leaves, while 
another will have small ones ; one kind leaves flowers of a 
pink or yellow color, another white ; one variety will produce 
a leaf black or brown, another- yellow or dark red. The 
following list includes nearly all of the principal varieties 
now cultivated : — Connecticut seed leaf (broad and narrow 
leaf). New York seed leaf, Pennsylvania (Duck Island), Vir- 
ginia and Maryland (Pry or and Frederick, James River, 
etc.), Korth Carolina (Yellow Orinoco, and Gooch or Pride 
of Granville, etc.), Ohio Seed leaf (broad leaf), Ohio leaf 
(Thick Set, Pear Tree, Burley, and White), Texas, Louisiana 
(Perique), Florida, Kentucky, Missouri, Wisconsin, Havana, 
Yara, Mexican, St. Domingo, Columbia (Columbian, Giron, 
Esmelraldia, Palmyra, Ambolima), Eio Grande, Brazil, 
Orinoco, Paraguay, Porto Rico, Arracan, Greek, Java, 
Sumatra, Japan, Hungarian, China, Manilla, Algerian, Tur- 
key, Holland (Amersfoort), Syrian (Latakia), French (St. 
Omer), Russian, and Circassian. Many of these varieties 
are well known to commerce, and others are hardly known 
outside the limit of their cultivation. 

All of these varieties may be divided into three classes,* 



•Probably most writers would divide tobacco into but two clasfles, including tobacco wied 
f ortlie manufacture of snuff with cut tobacco. 

382 



KINDS USED FOR CIGARS. 383 

viz.: cigar, snuff, and cut-leaf tobacco. The first class, cigar 
leaf, includes all those varieties of tobacco that are used in 
the manufacture of cigars, and embraces the finest quality of 
tobacco grown, including Connecticut seed leaf, Havana, 
Yara, Manilla, Giron, Paraguayan, Mexican, Brazilian, 
Sumatra, etc. The second class embraces all of the varieties 
used in the manufacture of snuff, such as Virginia, Holland 
(Amersfoort), Brazilian, French (St. Omer), etc. The third "1 
class includes all of those tobaccos used for smoking and I 
chewing purposes, such as Virginia, Kentucky, Missouri, \ 
Ohio, Maryland, Latakia, Perique, Turkish, and others. — ^ 

South American tobaccos are almost exclusively used for the 
manufacture of cigars. Although of various qualities, they 
possess the distinctive fiavor which characterizes all tobacco 
used for this purpose. This is generally the case with most 
of the tobacco grown in the tropics — it seems to be especially 
adapted for the manufacture of cigars, rather than for cutting 
purposes. European tobaccos are milder in flavor, and are 
used extensively in the manufacture of snuff; while the"^\ 
tobacco of the East is well adapted for the pipe. -^ 

Tobacco to be used for cigars must not only be of good 
flavor, but must burn freely, without which it has no real 
value for this purpose. Non-burning tobaccos cannot be 
used, and are either employed in the manufacture of snuff or 
for cutting. 

Of the many kinds of tobacco of both the Old and New 
World, doubtless the most curious of all is that kind known 
as 

DWARF TOBACCO. 

This plant is a native of Mexico, and was discovered by 
Houston, who found it growing near Vera Cruz. This is 
probably the smallest kind of tobacco known. The plant 
grows to the height of about eighteen inches, the leaves grow- 
ing in tufts at the base of the plant. Some have supposed 
this tobacco to be what is known as Deer Tongue, which is 
used for flavoring, but it is quite probable that it is entirely 
different. The leaf is small and light green, and it is quite 



384 



DWARF TOBACCO. 




MEXICAN DWARy TOBACCO. 



a showy plant when in blossom. As a curiosity it can hardly 
fail to attract attention from all those acquainted and inter- 
ested in tobacco, but 
will hardly admit of 
cultivation, o n a c - 
count of the absence 
of leaves, with the 
exception of the few 
growing n e a r t h e 
ground. Of all the 
tobaccos used for 
the manufacture of 
cigars, none have 
obtained an equal 
reputation (simply 
as a cigar wrapper) 
with the famous and much sought for variety known as 

CONNECTICUT SEED LEAF, 

which in all respects towers far above the seed products of the 
other states. The varieties cultivated in the United States 
and known, as "seed leaf" tobaccos, are grown in Connecti- 
cut, Massachusetts, Vermont, New Hampshire, New York, 
Pennsylvania, Ohio and "Wisconsin. All of the seed leaf of 
these states is used exclusively in the manufacture of cigars. 
Connecticut seed leaf is justly celebrated as the finest known 
for cigar wrappers, from the superiority of its color and 
texture, and the good burning quality of the leaf. The plant 
grows to the height of about five feet, with leaves from two 
and one half to three feet in length and from fifteen to 
twenty inches broad, fitted preeminently by their large size 
for wrappers, which are obtained at such a distance from the 
stem of the leaf as to be free from large veins. 

Connecticut seed leaf tobacco in color, is either dark or 
light cinnamon, two of the most fashionable colors to be 
found in American tobaccos. The plant is strong and vigor- 
ous, ripening in a few weeks, and when properly cultivated 



CONNECTICUT SEED LEAF. 



385 



attaining a very large size. There are two principal varie- 
ties of Connecticut seed leaf, viz. — broad and narrow leaf : of 
these two, the broad leaf is considered the finest, cutting up 
to better advantage and ripening and curing fully as well. 




CONNECTICUT SEED LEAF. 

Connecticut seed leaf attains its finest form and perfection of 
leaf in the rich meadows of the Connecticut Valley, where 
it has been cultivated to a greater or less extent for nearly 
half a century. 

The plant is one of the most showy of all the varieties of 
tobacco. The stalk is straight and large, while the leaf 
(especially the broad) is admirably proportioned, and the top 
is broad and graceful, rendering it far more symmetrical in 
appearance than many of the smaller varieties. 

Before Connecticut tobacco became known as a wrapper, 

Maryland and Havana tobaccos were used for this purpose, 

and when Connecticut first came into use, it was only as a filler. 

This variety differs very materially from Havana in this 

respect — it has not that fine flavor of Cuba tobacco, but in 

texture is much superior. The lighter shades of it burn 

purely and freely, leaving a white or pearl colored ash, which 

is one of the best evidences of a good wrapper. The leaf 
25 



386 ORIGIN OF THIS VARIETY. 

also is very firm and strong, and suflBcientlj elastic to bear 
considerable manipulating in manufacture. The various 
shades also of the two colors, dark and light brown or cinna- 
mon, are among the finest and most delicate of any to be 
found among the numerous kinds of tobacco used for cigars. 
The color of the wrapper, however, is merely a matter of 
taste ; when first used for a wrapper the color in demand was 
a dark brown or cinnamon, now it is light cinnamon leaf that 
is the most fashionable, and leaf of this color is considered 
the finest and of the most delicate fiavor. As a superior 
burning tobacco, seed leaf especially commends itself, and 
while all of the seed products of the various states producing 
this description of tobacco, are remarkable for their good 
burning qualities, none are more so than Connecticut seed 
leaf. 

Thorough cultivation by the growers has made this quality 
of tobacco the most profitable of any grown in the United 
States. Some considerable controversy has arisen among 
tobacco-growers concerning the origin of this famous variety. 
One opinion sets forth that it sprung from plants or seeds 
brought from Virginia, while another is that tobacco seed 
from Cuba gave it origin. Most probably the former theory 
is correct, as the plant was cultivated in gardens in New Eng- 
land, during the reign of Charles I. 

However this may be, the system of cultivation pursued 
has been successful in the production of a leaf tobacco that 
can hardly be improved, so far as the texture of the leaf is 
concerned. Some of the "selections" of seed leaf have that 
fine soft feeling peculiar to satin or silks, and we have seen 
specimens of such selections, that seemed almost destitute of 
veins, or anything that would naturally suggest that it was a 
leaf. In this respect it is quite remarkable, for while the 
leaf is very large the stem and veins are quite small, no 
larger than in many varieties with a much smaller leaf. 
From its first cultivation in the Connecticut valley, the 
quality has gradually improved until now, and it seems at 
last to possess almost every feature desirable in a good wrapper. 




HAVANA TOBACCO, 387 

This famous variety of the tobacco plant is by common con- 
sent the finest flavored tobacco for cigars 
now being cultivated. Some, however, 
consider Paraguay ian, Brazil, and Mexi- 
can coast tobacco its equals, while, accord- 
ing to Tomlinson, Macuba tobacco, grown 
on the island of Martinica, stands at the 
head of all varieties of the plant. These 
statements may, however, be regarded as 
mere opinions rather than acknowledged 
facts. 

Havana tobacco, according to Hazard, havana tobacco. 
*' grows to a height of from six to nine 
feet, as allowed, with oblong, spear-shaped leaves ; the tobac- 
co being stronger when few leaves are permitted to grow. 
The leaves when young are of a dark -green color and have 
rather a smooth appearance, changing at maturity into 
yellowish-green. The plant grows quickly, and by careful 
pruning a fine colored leaf is obtained, varying from a straw 
color to dark brown or black," The plant bears a pink 
blossom, which is succeeded by capsules not quite as large as 
those of seed-leaf tobacco. The finest is grown in the Vuelta 
de Abajo, which, for nearly a century, has been celebrated as 
a fine tobacco-producing district. When growing, a vega of 
Havana tobacco forms a most pleasing feature of the land- ' 
scape. As the plants ripen, the dark, glossy green of the 
leaves is succeeded by a lighter shade and a thickening of 
the leaf. The plant ripens in from eight to ten weeks after 
being transplanted. The stalk and leaves are not as large as 
its great rival, Connecticut seed-leaf, but it far surpasses it in 
flavor. The plant emits a pleasant odor while growing, like 
most varieties of the plant grown in the tropics. 

YAKA TOBACCO. 

This variety of tobacco, like Havana, is grown upon the \ 
island of Cuba, but is unlike it in flavor, as well as in the 
appearance of the plant. It is well known as an admirable 
tobacco for cigars, but is not sought after or grown to such 



388 YARA AND VIRGINIA TOBACCO. 

an extent as Havana. The leaf when growing, is in color a 
fine green, and when cured is of considerable body and fine 
texture. A writer in alluding to Yara tobacco says : 

"The most noted vega or tobacco plantation is situated 
near Santiago de Cuba and is called Yara. The choicest 
tobacco is that grown on the banks of rivers which are peri- 
odically overflowed. They are called Lo Rio, Rio Hondo, 
and Pinar del Rio, and the tobacco is distinguished from all 
other grown upon the island by a fine sand which is found 
in the creases of the leaves." 

The flavor of Yara tobacco is so essentially diflferent from 
Havana, that it is not cultivated as extensively, if indeed it 
could be. It is grown more particularly for home use and 
for exporting to Europe, where it is considered one of the 
finest of tobaccos. Of the other varieties grown in the West 
Indies such as St. Domiifgo, Jamaica, and Trinidad, much 
may be said both in praise and dispraise. St. Domingo and 
Trinidad have been cultivated for more than two hundred 
years. St. Domingo tobacco has a large leaf, but is of infe- 
rior flavor to most varieties of "West India tobacco. 

Virginia tobacco has acquired a reputation which has grad- 
ually strengthened for more than 
two hundred and fifty years. It 
was one of the first products to be 
cultivated by the English colony, 
and in less than a quarter of a 
century after the settlement of 
Virginia, had acquired a reputa- 
tion hardly surpassed by its well 
known rivals, Trinidad, Brazil, 
St. Domingo, and Varinos tobac- 
cos. The plant grows to the 
height of from five to seven 

VIRGINIA TOBACCO. => 

feet; the leaves are long and 
broad, and when cured are of various colors, from a rich 
brown to a fine yellow. The finest of Virginia tobacco comes 
from the mountainous counties, but the amount is small in 
proportion to the vast quantities raised on the lowlands of 




JAMES RIVER TOBACCO. 389 

the Dan and James rivers and their tributaries. The leaf 
grown in the higher counties of South-western Virginia is 
much lighter in color and much softer than the ordinary 
Virginia tobacco. Shades of color in Virginia tobacco (as 
well as in most others) serve to determine its use, while text- 
ure and length of leaf affect as well its market value. There 
are various grades of Virginia tobacco, especially in that 
grown in Southside, Virginia. " Long bright leaf " is con- 
eidered the finest, while that known as " Luga " is the poorest 
and lowest grade of leaf. 

The staple known as James River tobacco has acquired a 
world-wide reputation, and the same ground is cultivated 
and planted with tobacco now as in 1620. Virginia tobacco 
is known chiefly as a cut tobacco ; " good, stout snuff leaf " is 
also obtained from it, which brings as much in European 
markets as " fine spinners." Missouri, Kentucky, and some 
parts of Ohio also produce large quantities for manufacturing 
into chewing and smoking tobacco. 

^ OHIO TOBACCO. 

C The tobacco plant has been cultivated in this State for 







OHIO WHITE TOBACCO. 



nearly fifty years. SulUvan, in describing the kinds used 
for cutting, says : — 



390 OHIO TOBACCO. 

"Two kinds ot seed are used, viz., the 'Thick Set' and 
the ' Pear Tree,' and of late years the ' Bnrley ' has come 
into favor. Nearly all tobacco grown in Ohio is ' fired,' that 
is, cured by fires or flues ; it is packed in hogsheads of about 
6ight hundred pounds net." 

Another writer says : — 

" In some parts her soil produces a fine yellow article 
called * Northern Ohio ;' it is manufactured into the finest 
quality of smoking tobacco, and is extensively used by all 
epicures of the meerschaum, both in this country and in 
Europe. Ohio also produces another variety called Ohio seed 
leaf, or more familiarly, ' Seed.' " 

While in another section she produces an excellent article 
of leaf for chewing. Ohio tobacco of all kinds is a large 
plant, and cures " down " to fine colors. One variety for 
cutting, known as " cinnamon blotch," is a leaf of good body 
and is considered an excellent tobacco for chewing. A few 
years since a variety originated in a very curious manner. 
We give the account as published by Prof. E. W. Smith : — 

" This tobacco is known by the name of White tobacco. 
The seed was procured about three years ago, in a very sin- 
gular way. There were a few hills of tobacco that looked 
very singular, situated near a thicket of bushes and trees. 
The rising morning sun sent its rays through this thicket, 
striking diagonally upon a few hills, and producing by some 
chemical law or daguerreotyping process the (white) tobacco. 
The tobacco was allowed to go to seed. This seed was sown 
the next year, and produced the same kind of tobacco. The 
tobacco, before the white tobacco was daguerreotyped, was a 
cinnamon blotch, so it may be seen by this freak of nature 
how it was changed from red to white." 



PERIQUE TOBACCO. 

There are many varieties of tobacco well adapted for 
Bmoking, of all colors and strengths. Of American tobaccos 
suitable for this purpose, none have acquired a wider reputa- 
tion at home than Perique. It is cultivated only in small 
quantities in one or two parishes in Louisiana. Perique 
tobacco may be used not only for smoking, but for chewing 
and for snuflf. The leaf when cured measures some eighteen 



A FAMOUS REPUTATION. 391 

inches in length by fourteen in width, is thick and substan- 
tial, has the appearance of a rich Kentucky tobacco, and 
when placed under press immediately after being cured 
becomes black without the aid of any artificial means. It is 
put up in rolls, or, as they are called, " carrots." This tobacco 
is raised mostly in the parish of St. James, La., and derives 
its name from an old Spanish navigator who settled in St. 
James parish in the year 1820. His first attempt at raising 
tobacco, for his own use, succeeded so well and gave him 
such a fine result, (the plant developing itself to a great extent 
and being very rich,) that he concluded to devote all his time 
to the culture of tobacco, in order to make a living out of it. 

The seed first used by him was the Kentucky, but this was 
subsequently changed for the Virginia, which has been in 
use up to this time, being renewed every four or five years. 
The tobacco originally put up by Perique was twisted by 
hand and placed under press for three or four days, then 
taken out, untwisted, retwisted and replaced in the press for 
five or six days. After undergoing the same process three or 
four dififerent times, it was finally left to remain under press 
for six months, and then taken out for use. Mr. Perique, how- 
ever, soon made a capital improvement in the mode of put- 
ting up his tobacco ; for, as early as the year 1824, we find 
the tobacco in beautiful rolls of four pounds, and as hard as 
a " Sancisson de Boulogne." 

This tobacco, which has retained the name of its producer, 
is still manufactured in the same manner as it was fifty-four 
years ago, the work still being done entirely by hand. The 
plant is cultivated as the Virginia tobacco by about a dozen 
small planters in that part of the Parish called "Grande- 
Pointe," seven miles from the Mississippi river. A small 
quantity is also raised on the banks of the river in the same 
parish by a few planters. The growers of Perique tobacco 
have tried Virginia, Kentucky, and Havana seed, but prefer 
the former — Havana producing too small a plant without a 
much better flavor. 

Tobacco is grown in other parishes of the State; it is 



392 SOUTH AMERICAN TOBACCO. 

however of inferior quality, and is used only for smoking or 
snuff. Perique tobacco, when cut for smoking, is very black 
in appearance, exceedingly smooth, and of peculiar odor. It 
is probably the thinnest tobacco cultivated; and is strong, 
> but of agreeable flavor. 

PERUVIAN TOBACCO. 

John Gerard gives the following description of the tobacco 
of Peru : 

" Tobacco, or henbane of Peru, hath very great stalks of 
the bigness of a child's arme, growing in fertile and well- 
dnnged ground of seven or eight feet high, dividing itself in 
sundry branches of great length; whereon are placed in 
most comely order very faire, long leaves, broad, smooth and 
sharp-pointed, soft and of a light green color; so fastened 
about the stalk that they seem to embrace and compass it 
about. The flowers grow at the top of the stalks in shape 
like a bell-flower, somewhat long and cornered ; hollow within, 
of a light carnation color, tending to whiteness towards the 
rims. The seed is contained in long, sharp-pointed cods, or 
seed-vessels, like unto the seed of yellow henbane, but some- 
what smaller, and browner of color. The root is great, thicke 
and of a wooddy substance, with some threddy strings 
annexed thereunto." 

MEXICAN TOBACCO. 

The tobacco plant seems to have been cultivated in Mexico 
from time immemorial. Francisco Lopez de Gomara, who 
was chaplain to Cortez, when he made conquest of Mexico, 
in 1519, alludes to the plant and the custom of smoking ; and 
Diaz relates that the king Montezuma had his pipe brought 
with much ceremony by the chief ladies of his court, after 
he had dined and washed his mouth with scented water. 
The Spaniards encouraged its cultivation, and to this day it is 
grown in several of the coast states. Various kinds are cul- 
tivated, but chiefly a variety bearing yellow flowers, with a 
large leaf of fine flavor resembling the Havana. The plant 
is a favorite with the Mexicans, who prefer it to any other 
product grown. It is cultivated like most varieties of 



CELEBRATED BRANDS OF TOBACCO. 393 

the tropics, and is hardly inferior to any grown in the "West 
Indies, and is especially adapted for cigars and cigaritos. 
After the first harvest another, and sometimes a third crop 
is gathered by allowing one shoot to grow from the parent 
root, which oftentimes develops to a considerable size. The 
quality of leaf, however, is inferior ; as is the case with all 
second and third crops grown in this manner. 

ST. DOMINGO TOBACCO. 

This well-known West India variety is inferior to most 
kinds grown on the neighboring islands. The plant attains 
a large size, cures dark, is coarse, and of inferior flavor. It 
is a favorite tobacco in Germany, and thousands of Ceroons 
are annually shipped to Hamburg. The West India islands 
produce many varieties of tobacco, which is owing more to 
the composition of the soil and climate than to the method 
of cultivation and curing. 

The demand for St. Domingo tobacco is limited. It has 
no established reputation in this country, and on account of 
the high duties can not compete with our domestic tobaccos. 

LATAKIA TOBACCO. 

This variety of the tobacco plant is one of the most cele- 
brated known to commerce. It attains its 
finest form and flavor in Syria, where it is 
cultivated to a considerable extent. For 
smoking it is among the best of the varieties 
of the East, and is used for the more deli- 
cate cut tobaccos and cigars. It grows to the 
height of three feet — each offshoot bearing 
flowers, the leaves of which are ovate in 
form, and are attached to the stalk by a 
long stem. The flowers are yellow, and ^^takia tob 
number only a few in comparison with 
most varieties. When growing, the leaves are thick, but 
after curing are thin and elastic. The stalk is small, as are 
also the leaves. While growing, the plants emit a strong 




LATAKIA TOBACCO, 



394 RUSSIAN TOBACCO, 

aromatic odor not like that of Havana tobacco, but stronger 
and less agreeable. 

The plant was introduced into this country by Bayard 
Taylor, and attains its full size in the Connecticut valley, 
where it has been tested by many growers. After curing, 
the leaf is a bright yellow of agreeable flavor, having the 
odor of ashes of roses. The flavor is similar to Turkish 
tobacco, but is said to be less delicate. 

After harvesting, the plants cure rapidly and on account 
of their small size rarely sweat. Latakia tobacco, however, 
is not adapted to the taste of American smokers, most of 
whom prefer tobacco of home growth to even the finest of 
Turkish leaf. Latakia tobacco can be raised with less labor 
than most varieties. Its diminutive size and its unpopular- 
ity, however, prevent its general culture in this country. 

RUSSIAN TOBACCO. 

In no other country in Europe is the tobacco plant attract- 
ing as much as attention as in the empire of Russia. The 
varieties grown in America, Cuba, Turkey, and Persia, have 
been tried, renewing the seed once in two or three years. 
The tobacco of Russia is mild, and of inferior flavor, and 
brings from 40 to 80 kopecks per pood. A very good quality 
of tobacco is grown in the trans- Caucasian provinces ; it also 
flourishes well in the Southern provinces. 

The plants attain good size, but lack that fine flavor when 
cured that other tobaccos possess. A recent traveler through 
Russia, describing the tobacco, says : 

" Russian tobacco is very mild and rather sweet flavored, 
though not equal in aroma to the Havana, or posessing that 
rich ripe taste so much prized in that well known tobacco." 

COLOMBIA TOBACCO. 

Colombia has long been celebrated for the quality and 
varieties of its tobacco. Its cultivation has been carried on 
for more than two hundred and fifty years, and Varinian 
tobacco had obtained a well established reputation in Europe 



COLOMBIAN TOBACCO, 395 

long before Raleigh's " would-be-colonists " sailed for Vir- 
ginia. The principal varieties grown are Colombian, Carmen, 
Ambalema, Palmyra, and Giron. Most of these tobaccos 
are used for cigar purposes, especially the latter. The leaf is 
fine, of good size, and marked with light yellow spots. 
Tanning says of the tobacco of Colombia : 

" The Cumanacoa, Tobacco de la Cueva, de los Misones, de 
la Laguna de Valencia cura seca and Caraco, de la Lagunade 
Valencia cura negro, de Oriluca, de Varinos cura seca, de 
Casovare, de Baylodores, de Rio Negro en Andull, are equal 
to the tobacco of the Brazils. The tobacco of the Cueva, in 
the department of Cumana, is said to be grown from the 
excrements of certain birds deposited by them in a cavity, 
from which the natives extract it : it is considered the finest 
tobacco in Colombia, The birds are a species of the owl. 

" The natives of Varinos, and in fact of the whole kingdom, 
chew a substance called chimo, which is made of a jelly, by 
boiling the Varinos tobacco, and afterwards mixed with an 
alkali called hurado, which is found in a lake near Merida. 
Both are an estanco of government, and produce a large 
annual income. The mode of cultivating the above tobacco 
by the natives is as follows : — They prepare a small bed, 
sifting the earth very fine, on which they sow the seed, and 
then cover it with plantain leaves for some days. As soon as 
the plants make their appearance, they raise the leaves 
about two feet, so as to give the plants free air, and to allow 
them sooner to grow strong. When they become large 
enough to transplant, they have the land prepared ; and as 
soon as the rainy season sets in, they plant out their young 
plants, taking great care to protect them from the sun, and 
to keep them clean as they grow up, as well as to prevent the 
worms from destroying or eating the leaves. When the leaf 
is ripe, it gets yellow spots on it ; and on bending the leaf it 
cracks. Then it is fit for pulling off", which is done, and 
the leaves are neatly packed in handsful, placed in a dry 
situation, and occasionally shifted from one place to another. 
When the leaves are well dried they are all packed closely, 
and well covered, to keep the flavor in. 

" The leaf is left in this state for one or two months, and 
then made up for use. They never top their tobacco, and 
the leaves never ripen together. The mode adopted by the 
North American planters is somewhat different ; they top 
their plants when they have eight full leaves, or they keep it 



396 TOBACCO OF BRAZIL. 

Buckered ; and, by this means, the leaves are large and sappy. 
" They cnt off the stem at the ground, when ripe, and hang 
it on laths for one day and a night, with the leaves all 
hanging down ; they then place it in their barns ; and, when 
these are quite full, they smoke it for some days, and let it 
remain in that way until the stem, as well as the leaf, is quite 
dry ; they then put it in a heap, and cover it up for market. 
They strip off" the leaves, and pack them in hogsheads, and it 
is received in London." 

SUMATEA TOBACCO. 

Sumatra tobacco is one of the finest varieties cultivated, 
and commands in European markets the very highest prices. 
The plant is a vigorous grower, and produces large, fine 
leaves of most delicate odor. The leaf is of beautiful appear- 
ance, of almost a silky texture, and in color a rich brown. 
It is extensively used in the manufacture of cigars, and on 
the continent it frequently realizes as much as 5s. per pound 
for this purpose. It sells in London for from 3s. 6d. to 4s. 

per pound, 

BRAZILIAN TOBACCO. 

Brazil tobacco is grown chiefly in the valley of San Diego 
and San Francisco. The former being on the west side of 
the Brazilian mountains, and the latter on the east. The 
San Diego is the finest, and the following analysis of the San 
Diego of Brazil, and Yuelto de Abajo, will give one an idea 
of the soil of these famous tobacco lands : — 
VuELTA DE Abajo, Cuba. San Diego, Brazil. 



Organic matter. 


9.60 


4.60 


Silica, 
Lime, 


86.40 


90.60 
.40 


Alumina, 


.68 


3.00 


Oxide of Iron, 


1.92 


1.20 


Loss by Evaporation, 


1.40 


.20 



100.00 100.00 

The tobacco of Brazil is grown in the same manner as in 
other parts of South America. The planter raises two crops 



THE ORINOCO TOBACCO. 



397 



t- 



a year ; curing for exportation as in Cuba or Venezuela. The 
plant grows to the height of about six feet, bearing leaves 
lanceolate in form, about thirty inches long, and from eight 
to twelve inches wide. The tobacco fields are very irregular. 
After it is cut it is placed on poles in the field, and after- 
wards carried to the drying sheds. It is gathered in the dry 
season in September. After curing, it is removed to the 
packing house and baled in packages, and then transported 
on mules to the coast for shipping. A large portion of the 
crop is shipped to Portugal. It is a dark maroon-colored 
leaf, and contains a large proportion of the nicotine oil. It 
is a high-flavored tobacco, and on this account is used for 
-cigars and cutting. 
.-- Burton says of the tobacco of Brazil : 

" The tobacco of the Kio de Pomba, especially the ' Fumo 
crespo,' is a dark strong leaf, well fitted for making ' Caven- 
dish ' or ' Honey-dew ; ' the weed flourishes throughout 
Minos Gerals. The soil will be much improved by compost ; 
and the produce by being treated in Virginia style delicately, ^' 
dried in closed barns with fires." - *' "^ 

VENEZUELAK TOBACCO. 

The Orinoco tobacco grows from four to five feet high, 
bearing large ovate 
leaves, and is in all 
respects a fine qual- 
ity of tobacco. The 
plant is grown dur- 
ing all seasons of 
the year. It is 
used chiefly for 
cigars, and is ship- 
ed to Northern Eu- 
rope. It is packed 
in carrottes, and 
then baled. In color 
it is dark mahog- 
any, and of good 
body and texture. 



*j 




ORINOCO TOBACCO. (VENEZUELA) 

The leaf is about eighteen inches long, 



398 PERSIAN TOBACCO. 

and about ten inches wide. The planters cure by air-drying 
in sheds, and afterwards it is tied up in hands and baled for 
export. For their own use, they have adopted the method 
of the Brazilians, sprinkling the leaf with water containing 
the juice of the poppy. 

The flavor is rich and mellow; a little more oily than 
Havana leaf. It is used for the manufacture of cigars. 
Orinoco tobacco makes very fine flavored cigars, burning 
freely, and leaving a pearl-colored ash; it is considered by 
the Venezuelans to be much better than any variety grown 
in South America. In cultivating it the planters use no fer- 
tilizers whatever, taking up new land as the old wears out. 
The crop is gathered first in May, and then in September. 

PERSIAN TOBACCO. 
Shiraz tobacco is a native of Persia, and is one of the finest 
varieties for the pipe to be found in 
the East. The plant differs from most 
varieties in the color of the flowers and 
the form of the leaves. It is not adapted 
for cigars as it does not readily ignite, 
and this variety together with Manilla, 
are known as non-burning tobaccos. 
After curing, the color is a light yellow, 
the flavor mild and not unlike Latakia 
and Turkish tobacco. The color of the 
flowers like those of Guatemala tobacco, 
SHIRAZ TOBACCO, PERSIA, j^ ^j^-j.^^ ^^^ -^ ^^-^^^ respccts Hcarly 

similar to other kinds. 

AMERSFOORT TOBACCO. 

This variety of tobacco is cultivated quite extensively in 
Holland, in the Yeluwe (valley of Guelderland). The plant is 
of good size and averages 1.580 kilos to the hectare. The 
cultivation is very carefully conducted on the richest soil. 
The leaf is very fine and is free from large fibres, fitting it 
for cigars. Large quantities are also used in the manufact- 
ure of snuff. The tobacco plant has been cultivated in 




FRENCH TOBACCO. 399 

Holland since its first introduction, with complete success, 
producing a variety for snuff unrivaled by any other tobacco 
grown in Europe. 

In color Dutch tobacco is both dark and light ; the former 
being used for snuff and the latter for cigars and cheroots. 

ST. OMEK TOBACCO. 

Tobacco is an important product in France, and affords 
the government an immense revenue. In the north of France 
two varieties are cultivated, the Brazilian and the Mexican, 
but the tobacco is unlike that grown in those countries. 
Most of the tobacco of France is small and inferior to Havana 
and Manilla. In the South of France tobacco is cultivated 
to a considerable extent, but is of inferior quality, lacking 
the rich flavor of the tobacco of Cuba. The cultivation is 
permitted only in certain departments, and the cultivators 
must use only the seed supplied to them by the officers of 
the regie. This is selected with the greatest care, the kind 
and quantity depending upon the nature of the land, the 
soil being carefully analyzed, and cultivation prohibited in 
soils which do not possess the constituents necessary for the 
growth of good tobacco. These analyses also determine the 
quantities and sorts of manure required to bring the land 
into fit condition. Most of the seed used is the produce of 
seed imported at various times from North America and 
Cuba. 

The cultivation is most carefully watched, and the statistics 
available concerning it are of the minutest kind. Not only 
is the area of each field of tobacco accurately measured, but 
each plant is noted down, and even each leaf on each plant 
is accounted for. St. Omer is used chiefly for snuff, some- 
times used with other kinds and is much esteemed by the 
French who consider it among the best of tobaccos. 

HUNGAKIAN TOBACCO. 

This variety is attracting considerable attention, from the 
fact that it is well adapted for the manufacture of cigars. 
Like Connecticut seed leaf, the leaves are large and well 



400 



SPANISH TOBACCO, 



suited for cigar wrappers. A considerable portion is adapted 

for other uses, and it is in some respects a good cutting 

tobacco. When in fine condition, Hungarian leaf burns 

freely and leaves a clean, light-colored ash. No variety of 

tobacco grovrn in Europe is attracting more notice than this, 

and if good leaf tobacco suitable for cigars can be grown, 

American tobacco will diminish in proportion. Hnngariau 

tobacco is a favorite with the Italian?, and large quantities 

are sold to the Italian monopoly to be used both for cigars 

and cutting. 

SPANISH TOBACCO. 

For several years the growers of tobacco in the Connecticut 
valley have directed their attention towards the production 

of a tobacco possess- 
ing all of the excel- 
1 e n c i e s of both 
wrapper and filler; 
in other words, if 
possible securing a 
leaf of light color 
and fine texture and 
good flavor, so as to 
combine all of the 
desirable features 
a n d qualities of 
tobacco in one varie- 
ty. Some few years 
since the Depart- 
ment of Agriculture 
at Washington dis- 
tributed a variety 
of tobacco seed 
among the Connecticut tobacco growers known by the name 
of Spanish tobacco. 

It has been tested by many of the largest tobacco growers 
in Connecticut, and found to be one of the best varieties of 
the plant ever cultivated in the valley. The plant grows to 




SPANISH TOBACCO. 



TURKISH TOBACCO. 401 

the height of eight feet, bearing leaves about two feet in 
length by one foot in width, is an erect, strong, growing 
tobacco with a small, hard stalk and stout, long roots. The 
plant, when growing, imparts a strong aromatic odor not 
unlike Havana tobacco, but is larger everyway, and of inferior 
flavor for cigars. By repeated trials its superiority has been 
demonstrated to a certainty, while the profit arising from its 
culture proves it worthy of attention from all cultivators of 
tobacco. 

When cured the leaf is very fine and light of color, the 
stem and veins of the leaf are small, thus fitting it for a good 
wrapper as well as filler. If the tobacco growers in the 
Connecticut valley can succeed in raising this variety, they 
will produce a leaf tobacco much superior to the common 
variety known as seed leaf. Beyond all question a much 
finer flavored tobacco than Connecticut seed leaf can be 
grown, and still retain all of the excellencies of the latter, 
Buch as color, texture, and size of leaf. 

TURKISH TOBACCO. J 

The tobacco of Turkey has been called by some enthusiastic 
smoker " the king of tobaccos^," but whether it possesses this 
royal preeminence over all other varieties must be decided 
by other than ourselves. That it is a fine smoking tobacco, 
no one can doubt that ever " put breath " to the favored pipe 
that contains the yellow shreds, but we should prefer by far 
to part with it rather than with its great rival, Havana 
tobacco. 

The plant is not as large as many varieties, but grows up 
strong and flourishes well on account of the care and attention 
given it by the Turk and his family, as it is in all respects a 
family plant, and the flower garden is generally the tobacco 
field. Turkey tobacco ranges in color from brown to light 
yellow, the latter being the most in demand. This variety 
is similar in flavor to Latakia and Shiraz, and these three 
tobaccos, Persian, S3'rian, and Turkish, are considered the finest 
and best adapted of all tobaccos for the pipe. The work of 
26 



402 



JAPANESE TOBACCO. 



cultivating a field of Turkish tobacco is very tedious, as large 
quantities of water have to be carried to sprinkle upon the 
plants. The finest colored, a pale yellow leaf, brings 
" inflated " prices, but more often by others than the poor 
Turk who grows it. 

JAPAN TOBACCO. 
Of the tobacco of Asia, the best known in Europe is the 

yellow leaf grown in Japan. 
In those provinces where a 
high degree of temperature 
prevails, the plant lives 
throughout the winter, but it 
is nevertheless customary to 
sow fresh seed in the early 
spring of each successive year. 
When fully grown, Japan 
tobacco attains an altitude of 
about six feet, bearing leaves 
long and pointed, completely 
enveloping the stalk. The 
JAPAN TOBACCO. Icaves, however, diflfer in form 

in different provinces, some 
being round and wide, others narrow and pointed, and others 
thick and long. 

The mode of cultivating also varies in the different prov- 
inces. The sowing and transplanting are dependent on the 
temperature of the locality, and each place follows its own 
customs. In autumn a great number of flowers spring from 
the tip of the stalk. These are about an inch in length, and 
of a pale purple tint. To these succeed small round capsules, 
inside of which are three small chambers containing a great 
number of light red seeds. The method of cultivation is novel, 
the manuring of tobacco differing from that of other plants 
in that it is plentifully applied both to the roots and leaves. 

GUATEMALA TOBACCO. 
The tobacco of Central America, though possessing consid- 
erable excellence, has never become an important product, 




*^^i 



MANILLA TOBACCO. 403 

nor to any great extent an article of commerce. There are 
several varieties grown in Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, 
and the other Central American states ; some of which by 
proper cultivation might be valuable to both the user and the 
manufacturer. One variety bears white flowers like the tobacco 
of Persia, but in other respects it differs but little from South 
American varieties. Numerous other sorts occur, many of 
which are local, and differ principally, if not solely, in the 
size or form of the leaves. 

The soil of Guatemala is well adapted for tobacco, and 
with careful cultivation it could hardly fail of becoming an 
important agricultural product. It is also probable that the 
soil of nearly all of Central America is adapted to the plant, 
and with the favorable climate, the varieties now grown 
would doubtless with proper care, become noted as tobacco 
well adapted for cigars. 

MANILLA TOBACCO. 

This variety is one of the most celebrated grown in the 
East. * It is used exclusively for the manufacture of cigars 
and cheroots, and supplies India and Spain with a vast quan- 
tity of the manufactured article. The plant is a strong, 
vigorous grower, bearing dark green leaves ; coming forward 
rapidly under the careful culture bestowed upon the plants, f 
After curing, the leaves show a variety of colors ranging 
from dark brown to light yellow or straw color. The leaf 
when cured, has a peculiar appearance unlike that of any 
other tobacco. It is of good body but smooth, and has the 
appearance of tobacco that has been ' frost-bitten.' The leaf 
is not as porous as most other tobaccos, and therefore does 
not as readily ignite, and frequently ' chars ' in burning — 
thus giving it the name of a non-burning tobacco. 

The plants are ' set ' wide apart, and during the first two 

♦Blanco thus describes the tobacco of the Philippines: " It is an annual, growing to the 
height of a fathom, and furnishes the tobacco for theestancos (licensed shops). General 
opinion prefers the tobacco of Gapan, but that of the Pasy districts, Laglag and Lambunao, 
In Iloilo, of Maaslnor Leyte.ia appreciated for its fine aroma; also that of Cagayan, after 
being kept for sonde years,— for this use lilce the tobacco of the island of Negros it Durns the 
mouth." 

tThe seedlings are planted in Jaaaary, and the greater part of the crop comes forward in 
May and June. 



404: MANILLA TOBACCO. 

months are carefully cultivated, when the top is broken off 
and the leaves allowed to ripen. In some respects, Manilla 
tobacco is one of the best varieties of the plant cultivated, 
and were it not for its non-burning quality, it would have 
but few rivals among cigar tobaccos.* We have thus, at 
some length, described nearly half of the varieties of tobacco 
now being cultivated. There are, however, others as well 
known and of equal value and favor. Some of these are of 
superior quality and of world-wide repute. Of those described, 
the varieties grown in the tropics are the most celebrated and 
of the finest flavor. As when first discovered, the tobaccos of 
the tropics command the highest prices, and possess qual- 
ities not easily transmitted when grown in a temperate clime. 



tobacco. 



The soil of many of the Islands especially of the Blsayas Is favorable to the growth of 
. The island of Negroe formerly produced iome of yery good quality." 




CHAPTER XII. 

TOBACCO HOUSES. 

HE drying houses or sheds for the curing and 
storing of tobacco are among the most interesting 
objects to be seen on the tobacco plantation. These 
sheds vary in size from a small structure capable of 
holding only a few thousand plants to the immense sheds 
with sufficient capacity for hanging the products of several 
acres. In the Connecticut valley, the Southern States, at the 
West, and in the Philippine Islands these tobacco sheds are 
often several hundred feet in length, built in the most substan- 
tial manner and provided with suitable side doors and venti- 
lators for the free passage of air, and the most perfect system 
of ventilation. The most substantial and finest tobacco sheds 
are to be found in the Connecticut valley, which are provided 
with every convenience for hanging and taking down or 
" striking " the crop. Many of them are painted and adorned 
with a cupola, which serves the double purpose of an orna- 
ment and a ventilator for the hot air to pass off from the 
curing and heated plants. Formerly, the tobacco being har- 
vested was hung in barns and sheds, used for storing grain 
and hay, and better adapted to other purposes than to that 
of a tobacco shed, where thorough ventilation is necessary to 
avoid sweat and pole-rot, attending upon the curing of the 
plants. Of late, tobacco growers, throughout the world, have 
paid considerable attention to the method of curing, and to 
erecting more suitable buildings for the purpose. At the 
South and West, the log tobacco barns are giving way to the 
more substantial frame buildings, and better facilities are 

405 



406 



TOBACCO SHEDS. 



employed for " firing " the tobacco in the sheds. Formerly, 
the tobacco sheds at tha South looked more like the rude 
huts of the herders on the pampas of South America, than 
buildings devoted to the curing of tobacco. Tobacco barns 







OLD CONNECTICUT TOBACCO SHED. 



and sheds are built of a great variety of material, and in 
various ways, according to the manner of building where the 
tobacco is grown. Thus in the Connecticut valley, such 
sheds or barns are large and commodious frame buildings ; 
at the South and West, many of them are built of logs ; in 
Cuba, of slabs covered with palm leaves or thatched. In 
Turkey, of stones covered with rough boards, and daubed 
with mud. 

In selecting a site for the tobacco shed, not only should its 
proximity to the tobacco field be considered, but also the 
ground on which it is to be built. It should always be 
erected on dry ground, rather than upon moist, so that 
no dampness may arise and injure the leaves in curing. The 
tobacco shed should also be built on an elevated spot, so that 
a free circulation of air may be had, which is hardly possible 
if built on low ground or among trees or in the woods as at 
the South. This applies more particularly to sheds where 



IMPROVEMENTS. 



407 



the method of curing is by air-drying instead of by " firing " 
or by " flues." In New England the strongest timber, as oak, 
is used for building, as the weight of the plants before fully 
cured is immense. The shed is braced at every point and 
generally rests upon stone posts so as to allow a good circula- 
tion underneath the building. Poles are used for hanging, 
either round or sawed, when the plants are hung with 
twine; when hung on tobacco hooks, laths are used, the 
hooks attached to the lath ; more frequently the plants are 
strung upon the laths without the aid of hooks, the lath 




MODERN CONNECTICUT TOBACCO SHED. 



passing through the center of the stalk an inch or two 
from the end. The doors lengthwise of the building 
are simply the outside boards hung on hinges, every second 
or third being chosen according to the ideas of curing enter- 
tained by the grower. Some planters are of the opinion 
that the plants need all the air that can be obtained, and 
keep the sheds open during both day and night, while others 
open the doors only now and then — closing during warm 
days, and during a storm. Sometimes the doors are hung on 
hinges at the top — opening but partially and not allowing as 
free circulation as when hung on the sides. 

Another building of late has been built by the growers in 
the Connecticut valley, called a stripping house. This build- 
ing is frequently attached to the shed or near by so that 
stripping may be performed during all kinds of weather, 



408 



STRIPPING HOUSES. 



without danger of injuring the tobacco, or the health of the 
stripper. Such buildings however are needed onlj in tobacco 
sections where the cold is extreme during the winter, when 
most of the tobacco is to be stripped. The stripping room 
or house is provided with a stove, a long table, or elevated 
platform, in front of the windows, of which there should 




STRIPPING ROOM. 



be several to admit plenty of light, and a number of 
chairs to accommodate the strippers. On the stove a 
kettle of water is kept constantly boiling or heated, the 
ascending steam of which keeps the leaves of tobacco from 
drying and consequently from cracking or breaking. When 
in condition for " striking " or taking down, the plants are 
carried to the stripping-room, and covered with boards 
and blankets, when the operation called stripping com- 
mences. Many of the stripping-rooms are built large enough 
to contain the cases after the tobacco is packed, thus answer- 
ing a double purpose. 

In Virginia and the other tobacco-growing states of the 
South, the tobacco barn is built altogether different, as the 
method of curing is by fires or flues instead of air curing. 
The height of the building is usually twice its width and 
length. In the center of the smooth earthen floor, is the 
trench for " firing," while around the sides of the building 



VIRGINIA TOBACCO SHEDS. 



409 




MODERN VIRGINIA SHED 



runs an elevated platform for placing the tobacco leaves in 
bulk ; and, commencing at a safe distance from the trench, 
up to the top of the building, reach beams stretching across 
for the reception of the pine laths, from which are suspended 
the tobacco plants. Many of the tobacco sheds at the South> 
are built like those of New England, but many lag structures 
are still to be seen and 
many planters prefer them 
to those made like other 
frame buildings. The old 
Virginia planters of a 
hundred years ago, built 
rough log sheds for hous- 
ing the plants, which 
afforded little protection 
from wind and rain, which, 
in consequence, injured 
much of the tobacco hang- 
ing around the sides of 

the building. Tatham gives the following description of 
the " Tobacco house and its variety " in his work on tobacco. 
" The barn which is appropriated to the use of receiving 
and curing this crop, is not, in the manner of other barns, 
connected with the farm yard, so that the whole occupation 
may be rendered snug and compact, and occasion little waste 
of time by inconsiderate and useless locomotion ; but it is 
constructed to suit the particular occasion in point of size, 
and is generally erected in, or by the side of, each respective 
piece of tobacco ground ; or sometimes in the woods, upon 
some hill or particular site which may be convenient to more 
than one field of tobacco. The sizes which are most generally 
built where this kind of culture prevails, are what are called 
forty-feet, and sixty -feet tobacco houses ; that is, of these 
lengths respectively, and of a proportionate width ; and the 
plate of the wall, or part whicli supports the eaves of the 
roof, is generally elevated from the groundsel about the 
pitch of twelve feet. About twelve feet pitch is indeed a 
good height for the larger crops ; because this will allow four 
pitch each to three successive tiers of tobacco, besides those 
which are hung in the roof ; and this distance admits a free 



410 



OKDINARY SHEDS. 



circulation of air, and is a good space apart for the process of 
curing the plant. There are various methods in use in respect 
to the construction of tobacco houses, and various materials 
of which they are constructed ; but such are generally found 
upon the premises as suffice for the occasion. And although 
these sizes are most prevalent, yet tobacco houses are in 
many instances built larger or smaller according to the cir- 
cumstances of the proprietor, or the size of the spot of ground 
under cultivation. 

"The most ordinary kinds consist of two square pens 

built out of logs of six or 
eight inches thick, and 
from sixteen to twenty feet 
long. Out of this material 
the two pens are formed 
by notching the logs near 
their extremities with an 
axe; so that they are al- 
ternately fitted one upon 
another, until they rise to 
a competent height ; taking 
care to fit joists in at the 
respective tiers of four 
feet space, so that scaffolds 
may be formed by them 
similar to those heretofore 
in the open field, for the 
tobacco upon, that they 




VIRGINIA SIlEn 150 YEARS AGO. 



described to have been erected 
purpose of hanging the sticks of 

may be open to a free circulation of air during this stage of 
the process. These pens are placed on a line with each 
other, at the opposite extremes of an oblong square, formed 
of such a length as to admit of a space between the two pens 
wide enough for the reception of a cart or wagon. This 
space, together with the two pens, is covered over with one 
and the same roof, the frame of which is formed in the same 
way as the walls by notching the logs aforesaid, and narrow- 
ing up the gable ends to a point at the upper extremity of 
the house, termed the ridge pole. The remaining part of the 
fabric consists of a rough cover of thin slabs of wood, split 
first with a mall and wedges, and afterwards riven with an 
instrument or tool termed a froe. The only thing which 
then remains to be done, is to cut a door into each of the 
pens, which is done by putting blocks or wedges in betwixt 
the logs which are to be cut out, and securing the jambs 



SUPERIOR SHEDS. 4H 

with side pieces pinned on with an auger and wooden pins. 
The roof is secured by weighing it down with logs ; so that 
neither hammer, nails, brick, or stone, is concerned in the 
structure ; and locks and keys are very rarely deemed 
necessary. 

" The second kind of tobacco houses differ somewhat from 
these, with a view to longer duration. The logs are to this 
end more choicely selected. The foundation consists of four 
well hewn groundsels, of about eight by ten inches, leveled 
and laid upon cross sawed blocks of a larger tree, or upon 
large stones. The corners are truly measured, and squared 
diamond- wise, by which means they are more nicely notched 
in upon each other ; the roof is fitted with rafters, footed 
upon wall plates, and covered with clap-boards nailed upon 
the rafters in the manner of slating. In all other respects 
this is the same with the last mentioned method ; and both 
are left open for the passage of the air between the logs. 

" The third kind is laid upon a foundation similar to the 
second ; but instead of logs, the walls are composed of 
posts and studs, tenoned into the sells, and braced ; the top 
of these are mounted with a wall-plate and joists ; upon these 
come the rafters ; and the whole is covered with clap-boards 
and nails, so as to form one uninterrupted oblong square, 
with doors, etc., termed, as heretofore, a forty, sixty, or one 
hundred feet tobacco house, etc. 

" The fourth species of these differs from the third only in 
the covering, which is generally of good sawed feather-edged 
plank ; in the roof, which is now composed of shingles ; and 
in the doors and finishing, which consist of good sawed plank, 
hinged, &c. Sometimes this kind are underpinned with a 
brick or stone wall beneath the groundsels ; but they have no 
floors or windows, except a plank or two along the sides to 
raise upon hinges for sake of air, and occasional light : indeed, 
if these were constructed with sides similar to the brewery 
tops in London, I think it would be found advantageous. In 
respect to the inside framing of a tobacco house, one descrip- 
tion may serve for every kind : they are so contrived as to 
admit poles in the nature of a scaffold through every part of 
them, ranging four feet from centre to centre, which is the 
length of the tobacco stick, as heretofore described ; and the 
lower ties should be so contrived as to remove away occasion- 
ally, in order to pursue other employments at different stages 
in the process of curing the crop." 

In Ohio, the tobacco barns are built in a manner similar to 



412 



OHIO SHEDS. 



those in Yirginia; constructed of logs and provided with 
trenches for fires in curing the tobacco. The tobacco sheds 
for hanging the tobacco cured by air-drying, are built of the 
same material without trenches, as smoke is not employed in 
curing "seed-leaf" tobacco. The sheds for both kinds of 
curing tobacco are large structures, varying in size according 
to the area of tobacco planted. Sometimes the sheds are 
built near the woods where fuel can be procured, and in the 
immediate vicinity of the tobacco field. The tobacco houses 
are built in the strongest manner and of the most durable 
material, and are well fitted for the purpose designed. In 
the counties bordering the Ohio Kiver, where a large quan- 
tity of tobacco is raised, the tobacco sheds are to be seen on 
every hand, the smoke issuing from the sides of the building, 
giving a stranger the idea of a burning building rather than 

the curing of a great 
staple. 

The following ac- 
:^ count of constructing 
tobacco barns in Mis- 
souri, is from a St. 
Louis paper: 

"We believe in 
small barns for any 
kind of curing. A 
house built 16 feet 
iuside and divided into 
four rooms and six tier 
high in the body is the preferable size for flue or coal curing. 
For flues they should be built on a very slightly sloping 
place ; just enough to make the flues draw well. Flues four 
inches lower at the eye than the chimney will be slope 
enough. The door should always be between the flues and 
in the end of the house, to prevent the drip from falling 
before the door and the eye of the flues. The tiers should 
begin eight feet above the ground and be placed two feet 
above each other to the top. They should be placed across 
the house so that the roof tier can conveniently be placed 
above them. The door, three feet wide and six feet high, 
furnished with a good, close shutter. A barn of this size will 




OHIO TOBACCO SHED. 



KENTUCKY AND TENNESSEE SHEDS. 413 

cure 800 sticks of common size tobacco, which will weigh 
about 1200 lbs. The proper construction of flues is of great 
importance ; they should be built of any stone that will stand 
lire without bursting. White sand-stone, bastard soap-stone, 
or any other that does not contain flint. The size of a flue 
for a sixteen foot barn, is generally about 12 inches wide by 
14 inches high inside. Not much care need be taken to have 
them smooth on the outside. If stone can be had to make 
the inside smooth so as not to obstruct the putting on of 
wood, it is all that is necessary. They should be run just far 
enough from the house-side not to set the house on tire, and 
there is not as much danger of this as may be supposed. 
Run the walls of the house-side all around, ninning the stem 
out at the middle of the upper side. The stem should be run 
far enough above the wall of the house to avoid danger of 
sparks from the chimney. The height of the inside of the 
flue should be preserved its whole length. The width may 
be slightly decreased from the elbow to the chimney. The 
inner wall is carried all around. But too much explanation 
bewilders ; we think we have said enough. As before said, 
we like small barns ; where too much tobacco is together, it 
all can not receive the heat alike, which is our main objection 
to large barns. As to the number of barns necessary, we 
would say that there ought to be enough to receive all the 
crop without moving any. Say one sixteen-foot barn to every 
8,000 hills of tobacco planted. As a general rule, plant one 
thousand hills for every hundred sticks house-room. That is, 
if you have three barns plant 24,000 hills, and if it is common 
tobacco, they will receive it. A much larger quantity may 
be saved in this number of barns by curing and moving out, 
but it is very troublesome." 

In Kentucky and Tennessee the tobacco barns resemble 
those of Ohio and the other Western states, and are large, 
commodious structures, provided with every facility for 
curing the plants. In other tobacco-growing countries the 
tobacco barns and sheds difier but little from those in Amer- 
ica, the only difference being in form and building material. 
In countries where tobacco is a government monopoly, large 
and comfortable buildings are provided for the crop with all 
the necessary accessories for the curing, packing, and storing 
of the tobacco. In South America many of the sheds are large 
and low, built on the plantation, and close to the tobacco 



414 



FOREIGN TOBACCO SHEDS. 



field. In Cuba, the curing houses are located on the vegasy 
and as soon as the tobacco is cut it is placed on the poles to 
dry or cure. In Asia, a large quantity of the tobacco is cured 
in the peasants' huts, where the smoke is said to impart 
additional flavor to the already fragrant leaves. In the Phil- 
ippines the largest tobacco sheds are found, described by 
Gironiere as " vast sheds," and of sufficient capacity to hold 
acres of the leaves. In Persia, where the celebrated Shiraz 
tobacco is grown, the sheds are simply covered buildings 
without any boards on the sides, the only protection afforded 
from the weather being supplied by light, thorny bushes, so 
that the plants may be exposed to the wind. After fully cur- 
ing, the tobacco is removed to another drying-house and turned 
every day. The drying-houses in other tobacco-growing 

countries differ but little 
from those described, while 
the manner of curing is 
similar, the plants being 
"fired," sun-cured, or air- 
dried — the three modes 
now employed in drying 
the leaves. If the tobacco 
of the tropics is fragrant 
while growing, it is doubly 
so after being harvested 
and carried to the sheds. 
The odor from the well- 
filled barns is borne on the breeze alike to friend and foe of 
the plant. As the process of drying goes on, the plants 
gradually lose the strong perfume ernitted during the earlier 
stages of curing, and by the time the leaves are " cured down " 
and the sheds closed, but little odor issues from the plants, 
and this continues to be the case until the leaves are entirely 
dried. 




PKRSIAN TOBACCO SHED. 




CHAPTER XIII. 

TOBACCO CULTFKE. 

OBACCO at the present time is one of the great 
products of the world. As an article of agriculture 
and of commerce, it holds an important place among 
the great staples, while as a luxury, its use has 
become as extensive as its culture. The tobacco plant is now 
cultivated in nearly all parts of the world with varying suc- 
cess, according to the system of cultivation adopted by its 
growers. Primarily cultivated by the aborigines of America 
in the rude manner common to uncivilized races, the plant 
has, by numerous experiments and careful culture, become 
one of the greatest of agricultural products. When first 
discovered by the Spanish and Portuguese, the plant was 
small, and in flavor " poor and weak and of a byting taste." 
As soon, however, as the Spaniards began its cultivation in 
the islands of St. Domingo and Trinidad, attention was paid 
to developing it, and in a few years the description we find 
of the latter variety is that it is "large, sharp, and growing 
two or three yards from the ground." 

At the close of the sixteenth century the Portuguese began 
its cultivation in Portugal, the soil of which seemed well 
adapted to the plant, and still further increased the size and 
quality of the leaf. Tobacco is now cultivated through a 
wider range of temperature than any other tropical plant, 
and whether grown amid the sands of Arabia, the plains of 
South America, or in the rich valley of the Connecticut, 
develops its finest form and perfection of leaf. During the 
last half -century the plant has been developed to a greater 

415 



416 TOBACCO CULTURE. 

extent than during the three hundred yesa-s succeeding its 
discovery. Now its cultivation has been reduced to almost 
an exact science, and the quality of the leaf is in a great 
measure M^ithin the control of the growers of the plant. 

Formerly it was supposed that the varieties that grew in 
the tropics could not be successfully cultivated in the tem- 
perate regions, but recent and repeated experiments have 
demonstrated the fact that the tobacco of Cuba can be grown 
with success in the Connecticut valley. While the tobacco 
of the tropics is the finest in flavor, the more temperate 
regions produce the finest and best colored leaf. The tobacco 
of the tropics, as to the uses to which it is put, is limited, 
while the tobacco of the more temperate regions can be used 
for all the purposes for which the plant is designed. 

The cultivation of the plant varies with the variety, the 
soil, and the use to be made of the leaf. Thus a tobacco 
designed for cutting purposes is cultivated somewhat difi^er- 
ently from that designed for the manufacture of snuff or 
cigars. In the one case the plant is allowed to remain grow- 
ing longer in the field, while in the other the work of topping 
the plants is performed at an earlier stage of their growth. 
Primarily but little attention was paid to the color and 
texture of the leaf, the principal object being the production 
of a leaf of large size, rather than one of good color, and of a 
silky texture. Now, however, these are most important con- 
siderations, and give value to the tobacco in proportion to 
the perfection of these qualities. 

The soil, too, is carefully chosen and fitted in the most 
thorough manner, while the fertilizers used are selected with 
reference to the color of leaf desired. "When first cultivated 
in the United States it was thought that tobacco designed 
for various uses could not be grown in the same state or 
section ; now, however, tobacco for cigars and for cutting are 
grown nearly side by side. But in the fineness of the leaf, 
tobacco culture has made its greatest stride. By a careful 
selection of soil, and by the judicious application of proper 
fertilizers, the leaf tobaccos of Connecticut, Cuba, and 



TOBACCO CULTURE. ' 417 

Virgiuia, resemble in texture the finest satins and silks. This 
result has been reached, not by the sacrifice of the strength 
of the leaf, but by the most careful culture and improved 
methods of curing. 

The first labor to be performed in connection with the 
growth of a crop of tobacco, is the selection of a site for, and 
the making of, the " plant bed " or " plant patch." These 
beds for tlie early growth of the plants until large enough to 
transplant, are made in various ways and at difierent times, 
according to the method of tilling adopted and the climate. 
In California the tobacco bed is made in January, in the 
Southern States, Syria, Turkey, and Holland, in March. In 
New England in April. In Mexico and Java in June, and 
in Persia in December. In the Connecticut valley the 
manner of making the 

PLANT BED, 

as given by a Massachusetts tobacco-grower, is as follows : — 
" No rigid rules can be given for any process in tobacco 
culture, which depends much upon weather and season, but 
certain advantages may be obtained by skilKul adaptation of 
general principles to circumstances. This is especially true 
of raising tobacco plants, which occupy an extremely slight 
depth of ground for weeks after sowing, making it necessary 
to prepare the whole soil with reference to the state of this 
thin surface. Any slight mistake of treatment may make in 
the end a difference of several days ; consequently each item 
is of importance. While every tobacco-raiser wants early 
plants, and appreciates the value of a good location for grow- 
ing them, many naturally sheltered spots of ground, protected 
from northerly winds by buildings, trees, or hills, remain 
unappreciated. Tight board fences are no protection worth 
mentioning. 

" A heavily manured crop of tobacco would fit such places 
for tobacco beds, and leave them freer from weeds than any 
other cultivation ; and a subsequent use of some commercial 
fertilizer would avoid the introduction of weed seed. With 
these precautions, and a careful destruction of all neighboring 
weeds, a tolerably clean bed may be expected. To prepare 
the ground, plow or loosen deeply with a large cultivator ; 
27 



418 



HOT BEDS. 




MAKING THE PLANT BED IN CONNECTICUT. 



harrow in two-thirds of the fertilizer to be used ; rake the 

bed perfectly level, 
then rake in the other 
third ; roll once, and 
another slight raking 
will fit the bed for 
sowing, after which 
it should be rolled 
down hard. If the 
soil is handled in dry- 
ing weather, it should 
be done quickly, be- 
cause damp ground, 
if prepared and rolled 
down before drying, 
will 'set' like mor- 
tar, and remain damp 
on the surface. 
Moisture and darkness are essential to the germination of 
the seed, and these conditions can be secured only by making 
the surface compact while damp. The disintegration of the 
deeper lumps, and the decomposition of fertilizers, will cause 
the surface to grow gradually softer. The effect of plowing 
is to break the ground into lumps, which lie upon each other, 
giving free admission to the air between them. Harrowing 
makes finer the lumps near the surface, and mixes the fertil- 
izer deeper than a rake can be used. The first raking is to 
pulverize and level, so that rains will neither collect in ponds, 
nor run off, but penetrate the soil evenly. The second 
raking is to mix the fertilizer equally through the soil, to the 
depth of an inch or less, and reduce the lumps to the size of 
peas, which is as fine as a medium loam can be made without 
danger of a tough crust. Too much working destroys the 
healthy grain of the soil, and reduces it to a paste, which the 
roots of the tobacco plants can penetrate but slowly. 

"The bed should not be watered before nor after the 
plants come up. The ground will be cold enough without 
any extra evaporation, and if the place is suitable for tobacco 
plants, and rightly fitted, the surface will be damp in the 
morning, even in very dry weather. If the plants need 
stimulating, sow on them a coat of Peruvian guano or super- 
phosphate at the commencement of a rain, regulating the 
quantity used by the amount of the water likely to fall. 
Superphosphate makes dark-colored, thick-leaved, stocky 



PREPARATION OF SEED. 419 

plants. Fish gnano has about the same effect, but gives a 
ligliter color and thinner leaf. Peruvian guano is more stim- 
ulating than either, and makes a light-colored, thin leaf. 
Great caution is necessary in the use of these powerful medi- 
cines to avoid an over-dose. A quantity that would be safe 
in a heavy rain, would in a light rain kill many or nearly all 
the plants, 

" Old seed will sprout sooner than new. The seed should 
be measured while dry, and the same spoon used every year, 
so the effect of a given amount may be noted and the quan- 
tity regulated by experience. Level the seed in the spoon 
with a knife-blade, like measuring grain in a half-bushel. 
After sprouting again, allowing for the seed, increase in bulk 
for each rod separately. The amount of seed needed to the 
square rod varies with different seasons, soils, and seeds, but 
can be loosely a tablespoonful. There are many breeds of 
tablespoons. Too thick sowing will nearly spoil a bed by 
causing it to produce weak, yellow, spindling plants, while 
thin sowing will give good square ones. A bed should 
appear about half stocked till the plants are nearly ready to 
set, when they will suddenly spread and seem to multiply. 

" Some growers sprout and some prefer dry seed. In 
favorable circumstances sprouting will give a gain of four 
to six days, but in many cases dry seed will be fully as early. 
A long sprout is liable to be broken off in sowing, or killed 
by cold, after it is in the ground. A sprout just showing will 
endure several nights' freezing if there is some warm sun in 
the day-time. One way to sprout is to spread the seed 
thinly on cotton cloth, and roll it up inside of woolen cloth, 
keep it in a warm place, and dip in warm water every day. 
In about four days the white spots will show. Sprouted no 
more than this, it will stand imfavorable weather as well as 
dry seed. A pint of meal and a pint of plaster to each rod, 
is a good mixture to sow in. Pouring from one dish to 
another many times will mix the plaster, meal, and seed per- 
fectly if dry. If sprouted, it should be rubbed through the 
hands a few times with the mixture, to dry it and prevent 
any bunches of plants coming from seed stuck together. 
The plaster will show on the ground whether the sowing is 
being done evenly. 

" Weeding should of course be done early and thoroughly. 
Weeds are stronger than the plants, and a little neglect will 
check them, making practically, perhaps, a difference of sev- 
eral days. A good way to prepare for weeding and taking 



420 VIRGINIA PLANT PATCH. 

up plants, is to make the bed about fifteen feet wide, and 
place round, straight poles across it about eleren feet apart. 
The poles should be three inches in diameter at the smallest 
end. They cost nothing and save moving blocks around 
with the weeding planks." 

If the plants are tardy of growth, or the season is back- 
ward, wooden frames covered with cloth soaked in linseed 
oil may be placed over the beds, which is far better than to 
cover with pine boughs or glass even. The cloth soaked in 
oil draws the rays of the sun and keeps the earth dry and 
warm, causing a rapid growth of the plants, which at this 
stage need forcing in order to be forward enough for early 
transplanting. A Yirginia planter gives the following 
description of making the 

PLANT PATCH. 

" Cut wood in September or October, so that it may season, 
to bum patches (beds) in winter or spring. For ten acres, 
or fifty thousand hills, burn and sow three patches each of 
Beventy-five square yards. Say one (if the land be in good 
condition) the latter part of December, and if it be not in 
condition then, burn one hundred and fifty square yards the 
first good weather in January or February, and the other the 
first of March. Select a place on some small constant run- 
ning stream, not liable to overflow, with a moist, sandy soil ; 
cut down all trees close to the ground ; get off all shrubbery, 
leaves, etc. The patch will then be ready for wooding. 
Commence by laying on skids ten or twelve feet long, four 
in diameter, three and a haK feet apart ; cover thickly with 
brush, then put on wood regular all over, and thick enough 
to burn dry an inch in depth. Commence your tires on 
the side, and continue to move after it has burnt hard 
enough. After it has burned, sweep off all coals, but not the 
ashes : then it will be ready for hoeing up, which can be done 
with good grub hoes ; hoe deep, but do not turn over the 
soil ; get off all large and small roots ; choj) over with hill 
hoes, and rake until the earth is thoroughly pulverized ; then 
put on twenty-five bushels of good, fine, stable manure, with- 
out weed and grass seed, and twenty-five pounds of Peruvian 
guano, which should be put on regularly, hoed and raked in. 

" For sowing, lay off beds four feet wide, so that the water 
from rains may run or drain off. For every bed four feet 



VIRGINIA PLANT PATCH. 421 

wide and twelve yards long, sow one chalk pipe bowl full of 
seed, after being mixed with ashes ; tread with the feet or 
pat it over with weeding hoes, that it may be close and 
smooth ; cover it with dog-wood, maple, or any fine brush, to 
the depth of twenty or twenty-four inches, to protect the 
young plants from cold or a drouth. After the plants have 
commenced coming up, re-sow the patches with half the 
quantity of seed first sown, which will not interfere with the 
plants first up, but make good re-planting plants. When the 
plants, or some of them, have grown to the size of a Spanish 
mill dollar, take oif the brush, pick off all sticks, weeds, and 
grass, and keep them well picked until you have finished 
setting out. 

" Should the plants not grow fast enough to suit, manure 
with Peruvian guano ; have it fine, and sow over in the 
middle of the day when they are dry, or if it be raining 
briskly, it may then be sown over. Should the patches be 
suffering for rain, put five pounds of Peruvian guano in 
twenty gallons of water, and sprinkle it over with a watering- 
pot. To destroy the flea, bug, or fly, put dry leaves around 
the patch, and set fire to them at night, which will attract 
and destroy them if they are disturbed with a broom or leafy 
brush." 

The old Virginia planters selected and made the plant 
patch as follows : — 

"The quality of earth, and places which are universally chosen 
for this purpose, are newly cleared lands of the best possible 
light black soil, situated as near to a small stream of water as 
they can be conveniently found, due attention being paid to 
the dryness of the place. 

" The beds, or patches, as they are called, differ in size, 
from the bigness of a small salad bed to a quarter of an acre, 
according to the magnitude of the crop proposed ; and they 
are prepared for receiving the seed in March and the early 
part of April, as the season suits, first by burning upon them 
large heaps of brush wood, the stalks of the maize or Indian 
corn, straw, or other rubbish ; and afterwards, by digging and 
raking them in the same manner of preparing ground for 
lettuce seed ; which is generally sown mixed with the tobacco 
seed (the same process being suitable to both plants) ; and 
which answers the double purpose of feeding the laborer, and 
of protecting the young tobacco plant from the fly ; for which 
intent a border of mustard seed round the plant patch is 
found to be an effectual remedy, as the fly prefers mustard, 



422 TENNESSEE PLANT BED. 

especially white mustard, to any other young plant ; and will 
continue to feed upon that until the tobacco plant waxes 
strong, and becomes mature enough for transplantation," 

A Tennessee planter gives the following description of mak- 
ing the plant bed as practised in his State. In some respects, 
especially in preventing the growth of weeds, it is the best 
process of making the " plant patch " that we have ever seen 
described. He says : — 

" To make a good plant bed it requires good management 
and pretty hard work. It will hardly be done well without 
the presence of the farmer to attend to it. The time to make 
a bed is from the 15th of October to the first of April. The 
best beds are made in the Fall, for the reason that the ground 
is then very dry and therefore more easily burned, and besides 
there is more time for the ashes to rot before the hot weather. 
A bed turned in the Fall will hold moisture better than 
burned later. It takes less wood to burn well. The plants 
are more vigorous and tougher. The soil should be rich and 
light and never tilled before. The location should be as 
much exposed to the sun as possible. It is best for a bed to 
be surrounded by timber. The bugs are not so apt to find it. 
Low rich valleys will generally do better than ridges, though 
any good rich new ground will make good plants if well 
burned and prepared. The ground should be raked very 
clean of leaves before packing on the brush and wood. The. 
fire must have a fair chance at the ground. The brush should 
be packed on straight and close, at least enough wood mixed 
with it to make it lie close. If the brush is green, endeavor 
to mix what dry stufi" there is thorough, so the fire will burn 
through without trouble. It is very important that the fire 
should be as hot as possible while it is burning. The bed 
should not be rained upon after it is set before it is burned, 
as it will be doubtful whether the ground beneath the brush 
will get dry well. 

" The ground should always be as dry as possible when it 
is burned. The bed should be set on fire in several places at 
once so as to have a very great heat on it at once. If the 
ground is well burned it will be a little crusty and whitish, 
and will pulverize beautifully. As soon as the ground is cool 
enough it may be loosened up and pulverized. This should 
be done well, and may be done with a good sharp harrow and 
then followed with hoes and grubbing hoes. Aim to keep 
the ashes and rich soil on the surface, and for this reason a 



CUBAN PLANT BED. 423 

bed is sometimes damaged by a too deep working. Rake 
carefully, getting off all the roots and trash. The bed should 
be drained by a little ditch around it on the upper side. If 
it is very early in the Fall, the seed should not be sown until 
the danger of very warm days has passed. After the last of 
November the sowing should be as soon as the bed is prepared. 
A little less than a heaping tablespoonful to ten steps square 
is about the quantity of seed. Cover the seed very lightly 
with the rake or tramping the ground with the feet. Cover 
the bed with a good layer of straight brush, not enough to 
keep the light rains from the bed, but at the same time 
enough to keep the ground in a moist condition even in hot 
weather. Make a low close brush fence around the bed to 
keep the leaves from being blown upon it. Re-sow whenever 
the plants are well up, so as to have two chances. Take off 
the brush cover when the plants are big enough to shade the 
ground themselves. If the plants are rather thin on the bed, 
dp not uncover until you go there to draw the plants. If 
there is any danger of a scarcity of plants, always put the 
trash back after drawing." 
In Cuba the 

"SEMILLEROS" 

or planting beds as a rule, lie higher than the rest of the 
farm. On the large vegas or tobacco plantations, numbers of 
planting beds are made under the supervision of the mayoral. 
Siecke gives the following account of making the beds or 
semilleros : 

" On the island of Cuba any field selected for the cultiva- 
tion of tobacco is divided into long beds {Canteras) twenty- 
five to twenty-eight feet long, and nineteen to twenty inches 
wide. The soil is then manured with a mixture of two parts 
of well rotten dung and one part of either sand or fine sandy 
earth. During the months of August, September, and even 
October, the beds are watered, and the seeds mingled with 
the nine-fold quantity of fine sand, are sown broad cast or 
through a fine sieve, and immediately after covered with a 
mixture of dung and triturated or molaxated earth, in such a 
manner that this mixture forms a covering layer of about 
1-32 inches. 

" The utmost care is taken to protect the seeds against the 
Btifling heat of sunrays as well as heavy showers. To 
this end forked sticks about three inches high, are placed 



424 COVERING PLANT BED. 

around the tobacco beds, opposite one anothef, and into 



COVKRISG PLANT HEl). 



these forks thin twigs are laid, which are covered with 
pgilm-leaves in such a way as to form a slight roof." 

In Syria the tobacco seed is sown in ground free {roiA 
stones, well manured with goats dung, and strewn over with 
prickly bushes to protect the young plants from birds. The 
plants are watered daily till they reach the height of eight or 
ten inches, when they are transplanted. In Persia where the 
celebrated Shiraz tobacco is cultivated, the seed is planted 
iii a dark soil slightly manured ; the ground is covered with 
light thorny bushes to keep it warm, and these are removed 
when the plants are a few inches high. The ground is 
regularly watered if required, and when the plants are six to 
eight inches high are transplanted. In Turkey " the tobacco 
seed is sown early in the spring, in small beds carefully pre- 
pared for the early growth of the young plants. In a few 
weeks the plants appear thick ; then begins the occupation of 
the farmer's wife, and their numerous children, whose little 
fingers are engaged day by day in thinning the beds, car© 
being taken to leave the most healthy looking plants. The 
husband is engaged either in carrying water from the nearest 
well by the aid of his mule, or in preparing the land for the 
reception of the plants. The beds are well watered before 
sunrise and after sundown." 

"The Hungarian peasantry always make their tobacco 
beds against the south ends of their houses. These beds are 
enclosed by hurdles two feet high, at the bottom of which 
stones are laid, and on the outside of these, thorns are thickly 



SELECTION OF SOIL, 425 

placed, to exclude the moles. They fill this enclosure to the 
height of eighteen inches with fresh, coarse manure, which 
they press closely by beating as they throw it on ; covering 
with finely pulverized earth mixed with dung of the preceding 
year that had become soil. They do not regulate their time 
of sowing either by the moon, month, the season, but by 
the holy week of the passing year ; it is on Good Friday that 
all of their beds are sown, and although this day may vary 
nearly one month in different years, they are faithful to 
their thermometer — their piety not permitting them to know 
any other. To the mysterious influence of the day, without 
regard to the season, they ascribe their success and they 
generally succeed." Bickinson gives an account of the man- 
ner of making the plant bed in the East Indian Archipelago. 
He says : " Not far from us is a hut inhabited by two 
natives, who are engaged in cultivating tobacco. Theif 
ladcmgs, or gardens, are merely places of an acre or less, 
where the thick forest has been partially destroyed by fire, 
and the seed is sown in the regular spaces between the 
stumps." 

After making the plant bed and tending through the weed- 
ing season, the next step to be taken is the 

CHOICE OF GEOUND 

for the tobacco fields. Tobacco, unlike any other plant, 
readily adapts itself to soil and climate. The effect produced 
upon the plant may be seen in comparing the tobacco of 
Holland and France, the one raised upon low, damp ground, 
the other on a sandy loam. The early growers of the plant 
in Virginia, were very particular in the selection of soil for 
the plant. The lands which they found best adapted were 
the light red, or chocolate-colored mountain lands, the light 
black mountain soil in the coves of the mountains, and the 
richest low grounds. 

Tatham says : " The condition of soil of which the plant- 
ers make choice, is that in which nature presents it when it 
is first disrobed of the woods with which it is naturally clothed 
throughout every part of the country ; hence in the parta 
where this culture prevails, this is termed new ground, which 
may be there considered as synonymous with tobacco ground. 
Thus the planter is continually cutting down new ground, 



426 THE SOIL AFFECTING COLOR. 

and every successive spring presents an additional field, or 
opening of tobacco (for it is not necessary to put much fence 
round that kind of crop) ; and to procure this new ground 
you will observe him clearing the woods from the sides of 
the steepest hills, which afford a suitable soil ; for a Virginian 
never thinks of reinstating or manuring his land with economy 
nntil he can find no more new land to exhaust, or wear out, 
as he calls it ; and, besides, the tobacco which is produced 
from manured or cow-penned land, is only considered, in 
ordinary, to be a crop of second quality. It will hence be 
perceived, (and more particularly when it is known that the 
earth must be continually worked to make a good crop of 
tobacco, without even regarding the heat of the sun, or the 
torrent of sudden showers,) that, however lucrative this k;ind 
of culture may be in respect to the intermediate profits, there 
is a considerable drawback in the waste of soil." * 

In the Connecticut valley where tobacco is grown for 
wrapping purposes, the selection of soil will depend upon the 
color of leaf in demand (as the soil as well as the fertil- 
izers determine in a measure the color and texture of the 
tobacco). If the grower wishes to obtain dark colored 
tobacco then the soil selected should be a dark loam ; on the 
other hand, if a light colored wrapper is desired he selects a 
light loam, and with the application of proper fertilizers the 
proper color will be obtained. 

The tobacco plant flourishes well either on high or low 
ground, providing the soil be dry and free from stones, which 
are a source of annoyance during the cultivation of the 
plants and especially in harvesting. "When grown on very 
low ground the plants should be " set" early, so as to harvest 
before early frosts. The plant may be cultivated on such soil 
in almost any part of the valley excepting only near the sound, 
or other body of salt water, the effect produced by plant- 
ing tobacco too near the sea, more especially in Connecticut, 
being injurious to the leaf, which is apt to be thick and unfit 



•Liancourt In his Travels In North America, says of tohacco culture in Virginia: "The 
nature of the country boyond the iames Riyer Is much more rariegated than on this side. 
At present they are preparing the lands for the planting of tohacco. After having worlied 
the land it is thrown into small hillocks. * * * The cultivation of tobacco, which has 
been very much neglected during several years, is more followed this year on account of 
the high price it bears in Europe ; but the soil has been so long worked with this exhausting 
produce, and is so badly manured (for manure is absolutely necessary for tobacco when the 
soil ia not newly broken up), that it 1b not capable of producing good crops." 



RULES FOR SELECTING SOIL. 427 

for a cigar wrapper. In some countries, however, the leaf 
grown near salt water is equal in color and texture to any 
grown in the interior. But generally the plant obtains its 
finest form and quality of leaf — whether in the islands of 
the ocean, on the great prairies of the west, amid the sands 
of Arabia, on the mountains of Syria, or along the dykes of 
Holland — on lands bordering the largest rivers. This is true 
of the tobacco lands of Connecticut, Kentucky, Virginia, 
Florida, Brazil, Venezuela, and Paraguay, as well as of those 
in the islands of Cuba and St. Domingo, where the rivers 
flow to the southern coast from the mountains which lie to 
the north. It must not be imagined from this that tobacco 
can not be successfully cultivated at a distance from valleys 
enriched by large and ovei-flowing rivers. Some of the finest 
tobacco grown in Connecticut is grown in counties some 
distance from the river that gives name to our state. 

When possible, select that kind of soil for the tobacco 
field that will produce the color and texture of leaf desired. 
For Connecticut seed leaf a light moist loam is the proper 
soil. The same field can be used a number of seasons in 
succession ; the result will be a much finer leaf than will 
come from selecting a new field each year. The early plant- 
ers of tobacco in Virginia soon ruined their fields by failing 
to manure them. In Maryland the soil best adapted for the 
growth of tobacco is a light, friable soil, or what is commonly 
called a sandy loam, not too flat, but of a rolling, undulating 
surface, and not liable to overflow in excessive rains. New 
land is far better than old. 

A Missouri tobacco grower gives the following account of 
the selection of soil for tobacco in that State : — 

"Select upland, or black oak ridges and slopes, which 
comprise a large area of the tobacco lands of our county, 
and carefully clear off all the timber, and take out all 
the roots we can conveniently, and break up the ground as 
thoroughly as can be done by ploughing and harrowing until 
»11 the tufts and dirt are perfectly pulverized." 

In Cuba the planters select the red soil as the best for fine 
tobacco. Some planters, however, prefer a soil mixed of ^ 



428 PREPARING THE SOIL. 

sand and ^ to f of decayed vegetable matter. In St. Domin* 
go the soil is not uniform. The planters select a deep black 
loam or tenacious clay, or even loams mixed with sand. The 
most fertile places are on the banks of the Yuna, from Laxaj 
to Jaigua, in the vicinity of Mocha, on the banks of the 
Camoo, and around La Vega. Around Santiago,, clay and 
sand predominate, and the soil can not be highly praised. 
Most of the tobacco grown in the island is raised in thd< 
valley of the Yega. 

Cussree, in treating of this, subject, says : — 

" The quality of tobacco depends as much upon the nature 
of the soil as of the climate. The plant requires peculiarities 
of soil to develop certain of its qualities. And these peculi- 
arities are such that art cannot furnish the conditions to 
produce them where they are naturally wanting. The sugar- 
cane grows chiefly on soils derived from calcareous forma- 
tions ; but few or none of these are fitted for tobacco, whick 
is cultivated only on sandy loams. Both the Cuban and 
American planters concur in asserting that a large quantity 
of silicious matters in soils is essential for the growth of 
good tobacco. 

" As already noticed, the rich clay loams on the banks of 
the James River, in Yirginia, do not grow good tobacco ;> 
while the less fertile silicious soils in the county of Louisa 
produce it much superior in quality. Small patches of 
tobacco are everywhere seen growing over the sugar produc- 
ing districts of Cuba ; but I saw no tobacco plantations in the 
calcareous regions over which I traveled. The soils rest 
upon the primary formation. Even in the tobacco districts 
the planters know the spots in the different fields that produce 
the various qualities of leaf." 

In 

PREPARING THE SOIL 

for the reception and growth of the plants, the fertilizing as 
well as the plowing of the fields should be performed in the 
most thorough manner. The first is essential for a large 
and vigorous growth, while the latter renders the cultivation 
of the plants much easier. The careful preparation of soil is 
80 intimately connected with all that pertains to the plant, 
that it should be done well in order that the best results maj 



FERTILIZERS. 429 

follow. Tobacco of good body, color, and texture, cannot be 
grown on land devoid of fertility. The field selected for 
tobacco, if heavy sward, should be plowed early in the spring 
or the fall before, and later in the season if the turf is well 
rotted. After spreading on the manure, the field may be 
plowed again and harrowed frequently until all the lumps 
are made fine, and the surface mellow. 

In the use of fertilizers select, if a light colored leaf is 
desired, either horse manure or tobacco stems. In the Con- 
necticut valley nearly all kinds of Domestic, Commercial, and 
Special fertilizers are used. Of domestic fertilizers, horse 
manure is considered the best, as it produces the finest and 
lightest colored leaf of any known fertilizer. Of commercial 
fertilizers, Peruvian guano is doubtless one of the best — 
imparting both color and fineness to the leaf. Of special 
manures, tobacco stems are perhaps the best, at least the most 
frequently used. Of the other special fertilizers, such as 
cotton seed meal, castor pomace, ground bone, damaged 
grain, tobacco waste and saltpetre waste, much may be said 
both in praise and dispraise. Cotton seed meal, when used 
with domestic manure is an excellent and powerful manure. 

If domestic manures are applied, use about twelve cords to 
the acre, composting before plowing under. As soon as 
spread, plow the field and see that all of the manure is 
covered. If tobacco stems are nsed, plow in from three to 
five tons to the acre, all of them at once, or a part in the fall 
and the remainder in the spring. If Peruvian guano is 
applied, sow on about three hundred pounds to the acre in 
connection with the domestic manure. Fish guano should be 
composted before sowing, either with loam or manure, and 
when used on light soil is a very good fertilizer, producing a 
light, thin leaf. After the tobacco field is harrowed it is 
ready for the ridger, which makes the hills and gathers 
together all of the loose manure on the surface, and collects 
it in the ridges. Where a ridger is not used, work ofi' the 
rows from three and one half to four feet apart, or even wider 
than this. In the Connecticut valley the field is marked and 



430 



VIRGINIA METHODS. 



hilled so as to give about 6000 hills to the acre. This will 
be a sufficient number if the growth is likely to be large. 
Where a ridger is used, manure can not be dropped in the 
hill and in many respects it is well not to do so, as the plants 




A TOBACCO RIDGER. 



are liable to be blown over during a storm — not standing as 
firmly in the hills as plants when no manure is used in the 
hills. If the hills are to be made with the hoe, avoid 
all stones, bits of turf and grass in making them, and select 
only the fresh earth — gently patting the top of the hill with 
the hoe. New made hills are better than old, but it will 
make but little difference unless the soil is very dry at the 
time of transplanting. 

The following description of the manner of preparing the 
tobacco field in Virginia by the old planters is quite interest- 
ing, and gives some idea of the amount of labor to be 
performed on the tobacco plantation : — 

" There are two distinct and separate methods of preparing 
the tobacco ground : the one is applicable to the preparation 
of new and uncultivated lands, such as are in a state of nature, 
and require to be cleared of the heavy timber and other 
productions with which Providence has stocked them ; and 
the other method is designed to meliorate and revive lands 
of good foundation, which have been heretofore cultivated, 
and, in some measure, exhausted by the calls of agriculture 
and evaporation. 



BURNING BRUSH. 431 

" The process of preparing new lands begins as early in the 
winter as the housing and managing the antecedent crop will 
permit, by grubbing the undergrowth with a mattock ; felling 
the timber with a poll-axe ; * lopping off the tops, and cutting 
the bodies into lengths of about eleven feet, which is about the 
customary length of an American fence rail, in what is called 
a worm or panel fence, f During this part of the process 
the negro women, boys, and weaker laborers, are employed 
in piling or throwing the brush-wood, roots, and small wood, 
into heaps to be burned ; and after such logs or stocks are 
selected as are suitable to be mailed into rails, make clap- 
boards, or answer for other more particular occasions of the 
planter, the remaining logs are rolled into heaps by means of 
hand-spikes and skids ; but the Pennsylvania and German 
farmers, who are more conversant with animal powers than 
the Virginians, save much of this labor by the use of a pair 
of horses with a half sledge, or a pair of truck wheels. 

" The burning of this brush-wood, and the log piles, is a 
business for all hands after working hours ; and as nightly 
revels are peculiar to the African constitution, this part of 
the labor proves often a very late employment, which affords 
many scenes of rustic mirth. When this process has cleared 
the land of its various natural incumbrances (to attain which 
end is very expensive and laborious), the next part , of the 
process is that of the hoe ; for the plough is an implement 
which is rarely used in new lands when they are either 
designed for tobacco or meadow. There are three kinds of 
the hoe which are applied to this tillage : the first is what is 
termed the sprouting hoe, which is a smaller species of mat- 
tock that serves to break up any particular hard part of the 
ground, to grub "up any smaller sized grubs which the mat- 
tock or grubbing hoe may have omitted, to remove small 
stones and other partial impediments to the next process. 
The narrow or hilling hoe follows the operation of the 
sprouting hoe. It is generally from six to eight inches wide, 
and ten or twelve in the length of the blade, according to 
the strength of the person who is to use it ; the blade is thin, 
and by means of a movable wedge which is driven into the 
eye of the hoe, it can be set more or less digging (as it is 
termed), that is, on a greater or less angle with the helve, at 



*Thl8l8 a short, thick, hesTv-headed axe, of a somewhat oblong shape, wtth which the 
Americaus makegreat dispatch. Thejr treat the English poll-axe with great contempt, and 
always work It over again as old iron before they deem it fit for their use. 

tThe worm or panel fence, originally of Virginia, consists of logs or mailed rails from 
about four to six or eight inches thick and eleven feet iu length. A good fence consists of 
ten rails and a rider. It is called a worm fence from the zigzag manner of its coDstructloa* 



432 IMPLEMENTS. 

pleasure. In this respect there are few instances where the 
American blacksmith is not employed to alter the eye of an 
English-made hoe before it is fit for nse ; the industrious and 
truly useful merchants of Glasgow have paid more minute 
attention to this circumstance. 

" The use of this hoe is to break up the ground and throw 
it into shape ; which is done by chopping the clods until they 
are sufficiently fine, and then drawing the earth round the 
foot until it forms a heap round the projected leg of the 

laborer like a mole hill, and 
nearly as high as the knee ; he 
then draws out his foot, flattens 
the top of the hill by a dab with 
the flat part of the hoe, and 
advnnces forward to the next 
hill in the same manner, until 
the whole piece of ground is 
prepared. The center of these 
hills are in this manner guessed 
by the eye ; and in most in- 
stances they approach near to 
lines of four feet one way, and 
three feet the other. The plant- 
DRAwiKG THE DIRT AROUND THE FOOT. BT always cndeavors to time this 

operation so as to tally with the 
growth of his plants, so that he may be certain by this means 
to pitch his crop within season. 

"The third kind of hoe is the broad or weeding hoe. 
This is made use of during the cultivation of the crop, to 
keep it clean from the weeds. It is wide upon the edge, say 
from ten inches to a foot, or more ; of thinner substance than 
the hilling hoe, not near so deep in the blade, and the eye is 
formed more bent and shelving than the latter, so that it can 
be set upon a more acute angle upon the helve at pleasure, 
by removing the wedge." 

The manner of preparing the soil in Virginia at the present 
time is thus described by a Virginia planter : — 

" The crop usually grown in Virginia is divided into three 
classes, viz.: — Shipping, Sun-cured Fillers, and Bright Coal- 
cured Wrappers and Smokers. The first may be grown on 
any good soil, upland or alluvial : the latter two on dry, well- 
drained upland only. All require thorough preparation of 
the soil to insure good crops. The work first necessary for 
this crop is to burn a sufficiency of plant land. To prepare 




TKANSPLANTING PLANTS. 



43a 



the land for transplanting, put the land in full tilth, then 
mark off with a shovel, plow furrows three feet to three feet 
four inches apart, and into these furrows sow the fertilizers ; 
then with turning plows, bed the land on these furrows, and to 
facilitate the hilling, cross these beds three feet apart with fur- 
rows by a shovel plow, and the hills are made, except to pat 
them with hoes. Hilly lands will seldom admit of this cross- 
plowing, and the beds must be chopped into hills. On new 
ground apply the fertilizers broadcast. It acts well, and for 
Sne yellow pays better on new grounds than any other lands. 
The culture is essentially the same for all classes of tobacco. 
Stir the land up as often as necessary to promote a rapid 
growth of the plants, and to keep down grass and weeds. 
' Shipping ' tobacco may be plowed later and worked longer 
than ' fine yellow.' For ' coal-curing ' sacrifice pounds for 
color." 

The next operation to be performed on the tobacco farm 
or plantation is 

TRANSPLANTING. 

As soon as four or five leaves on a plant about the size of a 
dollar have appeared, they are large enough to transplant. 




TRANSPLANTING. 



Take thd plants up with care, sprinkling with water and 
keeping covered. In taking them up, the earth may be 



28 



434 



SETTING. 



allowed to remain on the roots, or shaken off, at the option 
of the grower. As a general rule, however, the earth should 
remain rather than be shaken off. Remove to the field and 
drop one at each hill, and where the plants are small, two. 
A common custom is to " set " every tenth or twelfth hill 
with two plants. This is a good plan, as they are frequently 
needed during hoeing time to " fill in." If holes have not 
been made, insert the first two fingers, making a hole large 
enough for the roots to remain in an easy and natural posi- 
tion. Press the earth gently around the plant if the soil is 
moist, but if dry, more firmly. See that the plant stands in 
an upright position. If dry after '* setting " the plants, water 
them, and if a protracted drought follows, cover them up 
with grass or hay dipped in water ; remove, however, in a day 
or two.* Plaster may also be used to advantage, as it keeps 




TRANSPLANTING. 



the hill moist, besides fertilizing the plant ; put a little just 
around the plants. In taking up from the bed select large 
ones, leaving the smaller ones to grow. Transplanting should 
commence as early as possible that this result may follow. 

•Walker says of tobacco culture In Colomtila (South America) :— "It is advisable to cover 
the plant with a banana leaf, or something similar: hy this means the tobacco is protected 
from the heat of the sua, and from the heavy rains, which would not prove less prejudiciftl." 



VIRGINIA METHOD. 435 

Plants with large broad leaves are considered the best, 
while those that grow tall and " spindling " or " long shank" 
plants, as they are called at the South, are rejected and 
should not be set out when others that are more " stocky " 
can be obtained. Avoid, however, setting too large plants, 
as they are not as apt to live as smaller ones. Transplanting 
should be done as fast as possible, that the tobacco field may 
present an even appearance and be ready to harvest at 
one time. If the plants are to grow and ripen evenly, the 
transplanting should be finished in a week or two from the 
time of the first setting. This can generally be done unless 
plants are very scarce, when circumstances, beyond the 
growers' control, often make the field give apparent evidence 
of want of care, although the real trouble is a want of plants. 

" It may be necessary to water the plants once or twice 
after transplanting ; this in a measure will depend upon the 
season." 

Tatham in his Essay on the Culture and Commerce of 
Tobacco, (London 1800,) gives an account of the manner of 
transplanting in Virginia at that period. Under the head of 

"THE SEASON FOR PLANTING," 

he says : 

" The term, ' season for planting,' signifies a shower of 
rain, of sufficient quantity to wet the earth to a degree of 
moisture which may render it safe to draw the young plants 
from the plant bed, and transplant them into the hills 
which are prepared for them in the field, as described under 
the last head; and these seasons generally commence in 
April, and terminate with what is termed the long season in 
May ; which (to make use of an Irishism), very frequently 
happens in June ; and is the opportunity which the planter 
finds himself necessitated to seize with eagerness for the 
pitching of his crop : a term which comprehends the ultimate 
opportunity which the spring will afford him, for planting a 
quantity equal to the capacity of the collective power of his 
laborers when applied in cultivation. By the time which 
these seasons approach, nature has so ordered vegetation, 
that the weather has generally enabled the plants, (if duly 



436 SEASON IN MEXICO AND PERSIA. 

sheltered from the spring frosts, a circumstance to which a 
planter should always be attentive in selecting his plant patch,) 
to shoot forward in sufficient strength to bear the vicissitude 
of transplantation. 

" They are supposed to be equal to meet the imposition of 
this task, when the leaves are about the size of a dollar ; but 
this is more generally the minor magnitude of the leaves ; and 
some will be of course about three or four times that medium 
dimension. Thus, when a good shower or season happens 
at this period of the year, and the field and plants are equally 
ready for the intended union, the planter hurries to the plant 
bed, disregarding the teeming element, which is doomed to 
wet his skin, from the view of a bountiful harvest, and hav- 
ing carefully drawn the largest sizable plants, he proceeds 
to the next operation, (that) of planting. 

" The office of planting the tobacco, is performed by two 
or more persons, in the following manner : The first person 
bears, suspended upon one arm, a large basket full of the 
plants, which have just been drawn and brought from the 
plant bed to the field, without waiting for an intermission of 
the shower, although it should rain ever so heavily ; such an 
opportunity indeed, instead of being shunned, is eagerly 
sought after, and is considered to be the sure and certain 
means of laying a good foundation, which cherishes the hope 
of a bounteous return. The person who bears the basket, 
proceeds thus by rows from hill to hill ; and upon each hill 
he takes care to drop one of his plants. Those who follow 
make a hole in the center of each hill with their fingers, and 
having adjusted the tobacco plant in its natural position, 
they knead the earth round the root with their hands, until 
it is of a sufficient consistency to sustain the plant against 
wind and weather. In this condition they leave the field for 
a few days, until the plants shall have formed their radifica- 
tions ; and where any of them shall have casually perished, 
the ground is followed over again by successive replantings, 
until the crop is rendered complete." 

In tropical . regions, the plants are transplanted as well in 
summer and fall as in the spring, but more frequently in the 
early autumn. In Mexico, transplanting is performed from 
August till November. In Persia, the tobacco plants are 
" transplanted on the tops of ridges in a ground trenched so as 
to retain water. When the plants are thirty to forty inches 
high, the leaves vary from three to fifteen inches in length, 



THE AMERICAN TRANSPLANTER. 



437 



when the buds are ready to be pinched off ; the leaves 
increase in size until August and September, when they have 
attained their growth." In Turkey " when the young plants 
are about six inches in height they are removed from the 
small beds and planted in fields like cabbages in this country, 
and are then left to nature to develop them to a height of 
from three to four feet ; three leaves, however, are removed 
from each plant to assist its growth." 

A year or two since, a machine was invented and offered 
to the growers of the Connecticut valley, called a transplanter, 
of which we here 
give an engraving. 
The inventor claimed 
that the "American 
Transplanter " could 
do the work of several 
men and do it equally 
well. It rolls along 
the ridge something 
like a wheelbarrow, 
marking the hills 
with a sharp joint in 




AMERICAN TRANSPLANTER, 



the wheel and setting 

the plants as they are dropped into the receptacles at the top. 
The tobacco plant, like most of the vegetable products, 
has many and varied foes. Not only is it most easily affected 
and damaged by wind and hail, but it seems to be the espe- 
cial favorite of the insect world, who, like man, love the taste 
of the plant. The first of them " puts in an appearance " 
immediately after transplanting, which necessitates the per- 
formance of what is known to all growers of the plant as 

WOEMING. 

There are two kinds of worms that prey upon the plants; 
viz : the " cut worm " * and the green or " horn worm." The 



*Hugbe8, in his History of Barbadoes, says that the common people call the worm kitifonla. 



438 



PESTS. 



first commences its work of destruction in a few hours after 
transplanting in the field. During the night it begins by 
eating off the small or central leaves called by the grower the 
" chit," and often so effectually as to destroy the plant. The 
time chosen by the planter to find these pests of the tobacco 




THE WORM. 



field is early in the morning, when they can be found nearer 
the surface than later in the day. Remove the earth around 
the roots of the plants, where the worm will generally be 
found. Occasionally they are found farther from the hill. 
If they are numerous, the field should be " wormed " every 
morning, or at least every other day, which labor will be 
rewarded with a choice collection of primitive tobacco chewers. 
Sometimes the worms are very small and difficult to find, 
while at other times more are found than are required for the 
growth and development of the plants. As soon as they 
disappear they make way for the "horn worm" who now 
takes his turn at a " chaw." By some the cut worm is con- 
sidered the most dangerous foe ; as it often destroys the plant, 



WORMING. 



i39 




while the other injures the leaf without endangering the 
plant. A little plaster sprinkled around the hill sometimes 
checks their progress, yet we have never found any remedy 
that would hinder their depredations very much. The plants 
should be kept growing as soon as transplanted, which will 
be found the better method, as they will soon be too large for 
the cut worm to 
injure them much, 
if at all. 

The "horn worm" 
feeds upon the finest 
and largest leaves. 
They are not found 
as often on the 
top leaves — especi- 
ally those growing 
on the very highest 
part of the stalk, as 
they prefer the ripe 
leaves and those 

lower on the plant. The horn worm, if large, eats the leaves 
in the finest part of them, frequently destroying half of a 
leaf. They leave large holes which renders the leaf worthless 
for a cigar wrapper, leaving it fit only for fillers or seconds. 
In Cuba the tobacco plant is assailed by three difi'erent kinds 
of insects — one attacks the foot of the leaves ; a second the 
under side; a third devours the heart of the plant. In 
Colombia the following are the great enemies of the tobacco 
plant: A grub, named ccmne, which devours the young 
buds ; the rosca-wo7"ni, which commits its depredations in the 
night only, burrowing in the ground during the day ; the 
grub of a butterfly, called by the Creoles palometa ; a species 
of scarabseus called arader, which feeds on the root of the 
plant ; and a species of caterpillar * which is called in the 

'Wallace says of wormlnK tobacco in Brazil: " The plants are much attacked by the c»t- 
erpUlar of a ephini moth, which grows to a large size, and would completely devour the crop 
nnlees carefully piclced off. Old men, and women, and children are therefore constantly 
employed going over a part of the field every day, and carefully examining the plants leaf by 
leaf till the insects are completely exterminated." 



WORMING TOBACCO. 



440 CULTIVATION. 

country the horned-worm^ so voracious as to require one night 
only to devour an entire leaf of tobacco. At the South, and 
especially in Virginia, the housewife's flock of turkeys are 
allowed to range in the tobacco fields and devour many of 
these pests. 

Almost as soon as the plants have been transplanted, the 
work of 

CULTIVATING 

should commence. As the tobacco plant grows and ripens 
in a few weeks from the time it is transplanted in the field, 
it is of the utmost importance that the plants get " a good 
start " as soon as possible. In a favorable season, and with 
ordinary culture, the plants will do to harvest or "cut" in 
from eight to ten weeks after transplanting. From the rapid- 
ity of its growth it will readily be seen that the plant should 
come forward at once, if large, fine leaves are desired. In a 
week from the time of transplanting a light cultivator should 
be run between the rows, stirring the soil lightly, after which 
the plants should be hoed carefully, drawing away from the 
hill and plant the old and "baked" earth and replacing it with 
fresh. If the hill is hard around the plant it should be 
loosened by striking the hoe carefully into the hill and gently 
lifting the earth, thus making the hill mellow. This is apt 
to be the case with stifi", clayey soil, which, if possible, should 
be avoided in selecting the tobacco field. 

It is doubtless as true a saying as it is a common one with 
Connecticut tobacco-growers, that the plants will not " start 
much until they have been hoed." "Where the first hoeing is 
delayed two or three weeks, the plants will to a certain 
extent become stunted and dwarfed, and will hardly make up 
for the delay in growing. In from two to three weeks, the 
field should be hoed again, and this time the cultivator should 
mellow the soil a little deeper than the first time, while the 
hoeing should be done in the most thorough manner. Draw 
the earth around the plant and cut up with the hoe all grass 
and weeds, and remove all stone and lumps of manure and 



BACKWARD PLANTS. 4,4,1 

any rubbish that will hinder easy cultivation, or retard the 
growth of the plants. At this period the most careful atten- 
tion must be given to the plants, as they are (or ought to be) 
growing rapidly, and upon their early maturity will depend 
the color and texture of the leaf. 

In a short time the plants may be hoed for the third and 
last time (as a fourth hoeing is but rarely necessary). At 
this time they have attained considerable size, (say two or 
three feet high) and are rapidly maturing, and ere long will 
be ready to harvest. At the last hoeing the plants should be 
" hilled up," that is, the earth should be drawn around the 
plant under the leaves, causing it to stand firmly in the hill, 
and keeping the roots well protected and covered. The 
tobacco plant requires constant cultivation, and the cultivator 
may be run through the rows after loosening the earth and 
turning up the manure towards the plants. 

Some growers of tobacco in the early stages of its growth 
apply some kind of fertilizers to the backward plants ; this 
will be found to be of advantage, and should be done 
just before a rain, when the plants will start in a manner 
almost surprising. A little phosphate or Peruvian guano 
may be used, but should be applied with care or the plants 
may be retarded instead of quickened in their growth. 

There is much to be done in the tobacco field besides cul- 
tivating and hoeing the plants. In many hills there will be 
found two plants, which should be re-set at the second hoe- 
ing if needed, and if not, pulled up and destroyed, as it is 
better to have one large plant in the hill than two small ones. 
Again, after the last hoeing, the tobacco should be kept free 
from worms. If any have been overlooked they will have 
attained to a good size by this time, and will devour in a 
short time enough tobacco to make a " short six." 

From this account of the cultivation of tobacco as practiced 
in the Connecticut valley, one will readily see that the labor 
performed during the growing of the plants should not be 
superficial. On their rapid growth depends the color and 
texture of the leaf. Plants that are slow in maturing never 



442 



CULTIVATION IN VIRGINIA. 



make fine wrapping leaves or show a good color. Where 
the growth is rapid the plants will be more brittle than if of 
slower growth, and must therefore be handled with care in 
passing through the rows to worm, top, and sucker the 
plants. 

A century ago the Virginia planters cultivated their tobacco 
fields in the following manner : — 

" Hoeing commences with the first growth of the tobacco 
after transplantation, and never ceases until the plant is nearly 
ripe, and ready to be laid by, as they term the last weeding 
with the hoe ; for he who would have a good crop of tobacco, 
or of maize, must not be sparing of his labor, but must keep 
the ground constantly stirring during the whole growth of 
the crop. And it is a rare instance to see the plough intro- 
duced as an assistant, unless it be the slook plough, for the 
purpose of introducing a sowing of wheat for the following 
year, even while the present crop is growing ; and this is 
frequently practiced in fields of maize, and sometimes in 
fields of tobacco, which may be ranked amongst the best 
fallow crops, as it leaves the ground perfectly clean and 

naked, permitting 
neither grass, weed, 
nor vegetable to re- 
main standing in the 
space which it has 
occupied." 

The next operation 
to be performed in 
the tobacco field is 
known by the name 
of 

TOPPING, 

and is simply break- 
ing or cutting off the 
top of the stalk, pre- 
venting the plant 
from running up to 
flower and seed. By so doing the growth of the leaves is 
secured, and they at once develop to the largest possible size. 




TOPPING. 443 

The leaves ripen sooner if the plant is topped, while the 
quality is much better. There are various methods of top- 
ping as well as different periods. Some growers top the 
plant as soon as the capsules appear, while others wait until 
the plants are in full blossom. If topped before the plants 
have come into blossom, the operation should be performed 
as soon as possible, as a longer time will be required for the 
leaves to grow and ripen than when topping is delayed until 
the plants are in blossom. In the Connecticut valley most 
growers wait until the blossoms appear before breaking off 
the top. Topping must not be delayed after the blossoming, 
in order that all danger from an untimely frost may be 
avoided. The top may be broken off with the hand or cut 
with a knife, the latter being the better as well as the safer 
way. Sometimes the rain soaks into the stalk, rotting it so 
that the leaves fall off, injuring them for wrappers. Top the 
plants at a regular height, leaving from nine to twelve leaves, 
80 that the field will look even, and also make the number of 
leaves to a plant uniform. Late plants may be topped with 
the rest or not, at the option of the grower. This mode of 
topping refers more particularly to cigar rather than cutting 
leaf. Those varieties of tobacco adapted for cutting leaf 
should be topped as soon as the button appears ; top low, 
thereby throwing the strength of the stalk into a few leaves, 
making them large and heavy. The number of leaves should 
not exceed fourteen. Let it stand from five to six weeks 
after it is topped. The object in letting it stand so long 
after topping is to have it thoroughly ripe. This gives it the 
bright, rich, golden color, entirely different from cigar leaf, 
but very desirable for chewing leaf. On account of the 
length of time it must stand after topping, it is desirable to 
take that which has been topped early, in order to have it 
ripen, and get it in before a freeze, although ripe tobacco is 
not injured by cold nights, and will sometimes stand even an 
ordinary frost. 

The manner of topping in Virginia by the first planters in 
the colony, is thus described : — 



444 SUCKERS. 

" This operation, simply, is that of pinching off with the 
thumb nail* the leading stem or sprout of the plant, which 
would, if left alone, run up to flower and seed ; but which, 
from the more substantial formation of the leaf by the help 
of the nutritive juices, which are thereby afforded to the 
lower parts of the plant, and thus absorbed through the ducts 
and fibres of the leaf, is rendered more weighty, thick, and 
fit for market." 

Now the custom is to top for shipping from eight to ten 
leaves, for coal-curing from ten to twelve, according in both 
cases to strength of soil and time of doing the work. 

In Mexico " as soon as the buds begin to show themselves 
the top is broken off. Not more than from eight to ten 
leaves are left on the plant, without counting the sand-leaf, 
which is thrown away," and destroyed in the same manner 
as the Dutch are said to do of spies. In some countries the 
plants are not topped at all, and the leaves are left upon the 
stalk until fully ripe, when they are picked. 

The next labor following the topping of the plants is called 

SUCKEEING. 

Immediately after topping the plants, shoots or sprouts 
make their appearance at the base of the leaves where they 
join the parent stalk. They are known by the name of suckers 
and the removal of them by breaking them off is called sucker- 
ing. At first the suckers make their appearance at the top of 
the plants at the base of the upper leaves, and then gradually 
appear farther down on the stalk until they are found at the 
very root of the plant. The plants should be suckered before 
the shoots are tough, when they will be removed with difiiculty, 
frequently clinging to both stalk and leaf, thereby injuring the 
latter, as the leaf very often comes off with the sucker if the 
latter is left growing too long. The plants should be kept 
clean of them and especially at the time of harvesting. 

An old writer on tobacco says of Suckers and Suckering : — 

" The sucker is a superfluous sprout which is wont to make 

its appearance and shoot forth from the stem or stalk, near to 

*Many of the Virginians lot the thnmh nail grow long, and harden it in the candle, for thl8 
purpose : not for the use of gouging out people's eyes, as some have thought fit to Insinuate. 



MATURATION. 445 

the junction of the leaves with the stem, and about tlie root 
©f the plant and if these suckers arc permitted to grow, they 




SUCKERINO. 



injure the marketable quality of the tobacco by compelling a 
division of its nutriment during the act of maturation. The 
planter is therefore careful to destroy these intruders with tho 
thumb-nail as in the act of topping, and this process is termed 
suckering. " 

After this operation is performed the planter ascertains in 
regard to the 

KIPENING OF THE PLANTS. 

As soon as the plants are fully ripe they not only take on 
a different hue but give evidence of decay. The leaves as 
they ripen become rougher and thicker, assume a tint of 
yellowish green and are frequently mottled with yellow spots. 
The tobacco grower has two signs which he regards as " infal- 
lible " in this matter. One is that on pinching the u^der part 
of the leaf together, if ripe it will crack or break ; the other 
is the growth of suckers to be found ( if ripe ) around the 
base of the stalk. 

Tatham says : — 

" Much practice is requisite to form a judicious discern- 
ment concerning the state and progress of the ripening leaf ; 



446 



THE HARVEST. 



yet care must be used to cut up the plant as soon as it is suffi- 
ciently ripe to promise a good curable condition, lest the 
approach of frost should tread upon the heels of the crop- 
master ; for in this case, tobacco will be among the first plants 
that feel its influence, and the loss to be apprehended in this 
instance, is not a mere partial damage by nipping, but a total 
consumption by the destruction of every plant. I find it 
difficult to give to strangers a full idea of the ripening of the 
leaf : it is a point on which I would not trust my own experi- 
ence without consulting some able crop-master in the neigh- 
borhood ; and I believe this is not an uncustomary precaution 
among those who plant it. So far as I am able to convey an 
idea, which I find it easier to understand than to express, I 
should judge of the ripening of the leaf by its thickening suffi- 
ciently ; by the change of its color to a more yellowish green ; 
by a certain mellow appearance, and protrusion of the web of 
the leaf, which I suppose to be occasioned by a contraction 
of the fibres ; and other appearances as I might conceive to 
indicate an ultimate suspension of the vegetative functions." 
After the plants have ripened the operation of cutting or 



begins. 



HAKVESTING 

The cutter passes from plant to plant cutting only 




CUTTING THE PLANTS. 



those plants that are ripe. In harvesting a light hatchet or 



CUTTING. 447 

saw may be used or a tobacco cutter which is the better and 
not as liable to injure the leaves. The plants may be cut 
either in the morning (after the dew is off) or just at night, 
providing there are no indications of frost. Lay the plants 
carefully on the sides to avoid breaking the leaves. If the 
plants are cut during a very warm day they should be examined 
from time to time as they are liable to " sun-burn," an injury 
much dreaded by the planter, as sun-burnt leaves are useless 
for cigar wrappers. 

After the plants are wilted on one side they are turned so 
that the entire plant will be in good condition to handle 
without breaking. Harvesting should be performed in the 
most careful manner. At this time the leaves are very brittle 
and unless the cutter is an experienced hand much injury may 
be done to the leaves. The stem of each plant is severed as 
near as possible to the ground and afterwards if hung on lath 
they are divided longitudinally to admit the air and dry them 
sooner. When the plants are to be hung on lath they may be 
wilted before " stringing " or not, at the option of the grower. 
Most growers are of the opinion now that the plants should 




^ 

PUTTING ON LATH. 



be harvested without wilting at all, stringing on the lath as 
soon as cut and carrying them immediately to the shed. 

When wilted in the field there is often much damage done 
to the leaves whether they are sun-burnt or not. Oftentimes 



448 



HANGING. 



the ground is hot and the plants in a few hours both on the 
under and upper sides become very warm and ahnost burnt 
by the rays of the sun. For this reason the manner of hang- 
ing on lath is the better way and in New England is fast dis- 
placing the old method of hanging with twine. When hung 
in this manner five or six plants to the lath are the usual 




CAKRYIKQ TO THE SHED. 



number unless they are very large. When placed or strung 
on the lath the plants are not as liable to sweat or pole rot, 
owing in part to the splitting of the stalk, which causes the 
rapid curing of the leaves as well as the stalk itself. A new 
method of hanging tobacco has been introduced of late in the 
Connecticut valley by means of tobacco hooks attached to the 
lath. This mode is considered by many growers the safest 
way, and by others as no better than the more common way 
of hanging simply on the lath. 

In Virginia in " ye olden time," the following method of 
harvesting was adopted : — 

" When the plant has remained long enough exposed to 
the sun, or open air, after cutting, to become sufficiently 
pliant to bear handling and removal with conveniency, it 
must be removed to the tobacco house, which is generally 
done by manual labor, unless the distance and quantity 
requires the assistance of a cart. If this part of the process 
were managed with horses carrying frames upon their backs 



CUTTING TIME IN CUBA. 449 

for the conveniency of stowage, in a way similar to that in 
which grain is conveyed in Spain, it would be found a con- 
siderable saving of labor. It becomes necessary, in the next 
place, to see that suitable ladders and stages are provided, 
and that there be a sufficient quantity of tobacco sticks, such 
as have been described to answer the full demand of the 
tobacco house, whatsoever may be its size ; time will be 
otherwise lost in make-shifts, or sending for a second supply. 

" When everything is thus brought to a point at the tobacco 
house, the next stage of the process is that termed hanging 
the tobacco. This is done by hanging the plants in rows 
upon the tobacco sticks with the points down, letting them 
rest upon the stick by the stem of the lowest leaf, or hy the 
split which is made in the stem when that happens to be 
divided. In this operation care must be taken to allow a 
sufficient space between each of the successive plants for the 
due circulation of air between : perhaps four or five inches 
apart, in proportion to the bulk of the plant. When they 
are thus threaded upon the sticks (either in the tobacco 
houses, or, sometimes, suspended upon a temporary scaffold 
near the door), they must be carefully handed up by means 
of ladders and planks to answer as stages or platforms, first 
to the upper tier or collar beams of the house, where the 
sticks are to be placed with their points refiting upon the 
beams transversely, and the plants hanging down between 
them. This process must be repeated tier after tier of the 
beams, downwards, until the house is filled ; taking care to 
hang the sticks as close to each other as the consideration of 
admitting air will allow, and without crowding. In this 
position the plants remain until they are in condition to be 
taken down for the next process." 

In Cuba about the beginning of January the tobacco is 
ready for cutting. If the harvest is good, all the leaves are 
taken from the plants at once. Tobacco consisting of those 
leaves is called Temprano, or " Early Pipe." If, on the con- 
trary, the harvest is not good, the immature leaves are left 
to grow. Tobacco formed of these leaves has the name of 
Tardio, or "Late Pipe." In every respect, appearance 
included, the Temprano is much superior to the Tardio. In 
the purchase of tobacco, it is a principal thing to ascertain 
how much or how little Temprano a parcel contains. More- 
over, there are what may be called bastard leaves, which 
29 



450 HARVESTING IN VIRGINIA. 

grow after the leaves proper have been gathered.* Tobacco 
made from these bastard leaves is easily recognizable, the 
leaves being long and narrow, of a reddish color, and a bitter 
taste. 

The mode of harvesting tobacco in Yirginia at present is 
thus described by a Virginia planter : — 

" In bringing to the barn place the tobacco on scaffolds 
near the barn-door, so that it can be readily housed in case 
of rain. As Bright "Wrappers and Smokers pay so much 
better than dark tobaccos, it is advisable, whenever practica- 
ble, to coal-cure all that ripens of a uniform yellow color. 
The quality of the leaf will determine the hanging : ' Ship- 
ping ' should be hung seven to nine plants to the stick four 
and a half feet long. To cure the plants properly requires 
some experience, great care, and much attention. The plants 
should not be ' cut ' until fully ripe. Be careful in cutting 
to select plants of a uniform size, color, and quality, putting 
six or seven to the stick. Let the plants go from the cutter's 
hands on to sticks held in the hands of women or boys ; and 
as soon as the sticks are full, place them carefully on wagons 
and carry them to the barn. Place the sticks on tiers about 
ten inches apart, and regulate the plants on the sticks. 

" It is impossible to lay down any uniform system or give 
specific instructions. General principles will be suggested to 
guide the planter amid the changeableness of seasons and 
variableness of material to be operated upon." 

In Turkey — 

" The planters calculate always fifty-five days from May 
12th, for their crops to be ready for gathering. When the 
leaves show the necessary yellow tips, they are carried to the 
house, and there threaded into long bunches by a large, flat 
needle, about a foot long, passed through the stalk of each." 

In Ohio the process of harvesting tobacco for cutting is 
thus described by a grower : — 

" When thoroughly ripe, having stood two or three weeks 
longer than is necessary for cigar leaf, it is ready to cut. 
This is done with a knife made for the purpose. It resem- 
bles a wide chisel, except that the handle and chisel are at 
right angles. Before cutting, the stalk is split down through 
the center. Being ripe, it splits before the knife, and follow- 
ing the grain the leaves escape unharmed. This splitting ifl 



*Sacond crop, or Volunteer tobacco. 



THE SEASON IN OTHER PLACES. 451 

done in as little time as is necessary to cut the stalk off in 
the ordinary way. Split it to within about three or four 
inches of the ground, and cut it off in the ordinary way with 
the same knife. Cut it off and hang it over one of your 
sticks that you have driven slanting into the ground near 
you. Cut and put six stalks on the stick, and then lay it 
down on the ground to wilt, taking the usual care to prevent 
sun-burn. When it is sufficiently wilted, haul to the shed 
and hang it up." 

In the East Indian Archipelago, " as soon as the leaves are 
fully grown they are plucked off, and the petiole and a mid- 
rib are cut away. Each leaf is then cut transversely into 
strips about a sixteenth of an inch wide, and these are dried 
in the sun until a mass of them looks like a bunch of oakum." 

In Persia, when the plants are ripe they are cut off close 
to the root, and again stuck firmly in the ground. By 
exposure to the night dews the leaves change from green to 
yellow. "When of the proper tint, they are gathered in the 
early morning while wet with dew, and heaped up in a shed, 
the sides of which are closed in with light thorny bushes, so 
as to be freely exposed to the wind. 

In Japan, the leaves are gathered in the height of summer. 
"When the flowers are of a light tint, two or three of the leaves 
nearest the root are gathered. These are called first leaves, but 
produce tobacco of second quality. After the lapse of a fort- 
night, the leaves are gathered by twos, and from these the 
best tobaccos are produced. Any remaining leaves are after- 
wards broken off along with the stem and dried. These 
form the lowest quality of tobacco. After gathering, the 
leaves are arranged in regular layers and covered with straw 
matting, which is removed in a couple of days. The leaves 
are now of a light yellow color. They are then fastened by 
the stem in twos and threes to a rope slung in a smoke 
room, and after being so left for fourteen or fifteen days, they 
are dried for two or three days in the sun, after which they 
are exposed for a couple of nights in order that they may be 
moistened with dew. They are then smoothed out and 
arranged in layers, the stems being fastened together, pressed 
down with boards, and packed away in a dark room. 



452 CURING. 

D'Almirda says that in Java, the leaves are gathered and 
tied up in bundles of fifteen, twenty or thirty, and suspended 
from bamboo poles running across the interior of the shed, 
where they are left to dry for twenty days or more, accord- 
ing to the state of the atmosphere. 

As soon as the plants have been hung in the shed the 
process of 

CUEING 

begins. If fully ripe at the time of harvesting, the plants 
will " cure down " very fast and take on a better hue than 
when they cure less rapidly. During cool weather the doors 
and ventilators should be left open that the plants may have 
a free circulation of air and cure the faster. When, however, 
the weather is damp, they should be closed, to avoid sweat- 
ing and pole rot. When a light leaf is desired, the tobacco 
shed should be provided with windows to let in plenty of 
sunlight, which has much to do with the color of the leaf. 
When a dark leaf is desired, all light should be excluded. 

The time necessary for the curing of the plants will 
depend upon the ripeness of the plants as well as the weather 
during curing. There are three kinds or methods of curing, 
viz : air curing, sun curing and firing, or curing by flues. 
Air curing is the curing of the plants in sheds or barns. 
Sun curing is the process of curing in the open air, while 
" firing" is the process of curing by " smoke," the common 
method employed at the South and to some extent at the West. 
This is the common way of curing cutting leaf, while air 
curing is the manner of curing cigar leaf. Tatham, already 
quoted, gives the following account of the process as per- 
formed in Virginia of 

"SMOKIHG THE CROP." 

" From what has been said under the head of hanging the 
plant, it will be perceived that the air is the principal agent 
in curing it, but it must be also considered that a want of 
uniform temperature in the atmosphere calls for the constant 
care of the crop-master, who generally indeed becomes 



CURING BY SMOKE. 453 

habitually weather-wise, from the sowing of his plants, until 
the delivery of his crop to the inspector. To regulate this 
eifect upon the plants he must take care to be often among 
them, and when too much moisture is discovered, it is tem- 
pered by the help of smoke, which is generated by means of 
small smothered fires made of old bark, and of rotten wood, 
kindled about upon various parts of the floor where they 
may seem to be most needed. 

" In this operation it is necessary that a careful hand should 
be always near : for the fires must not be permitted to blaze, 
and burn furiously ; which might not only endanger the 
house, but which, by occasioning a sudden over-heat while 
the leaf is in a moist condition, might add to the malady of 
' firing ' which often occurs in the field." 

In Virginia the manner of curing tobacco at the present 
time, is thus described by a planter. " For curing tobacco 
the simplest method is sun-curing or air curing and the one 
most likely to prove successful. The tobacco barn should 
be so constructed as to contain four, five or six rooms four 
feet wide, so that four and a half feet sticks may fit, all alike. 
Log barns are best for coal curing. All should be built high 
enough to contain four firing tiers under joists covered with 
shingles or boards and daubed close. Fire with hickory all 
rich, heavy, shipping tobacco. 

" As soon as the barn is filled kindle small fires of coals or 
hickory wood, about twenty fires to a barn twenty feet square, 
four under each room. Coal is best, but hickory saplings, 
chopped about two feet long, make a good steaming heat. 
The successful coal-curer is an artist, and all engaged in the 
business are experimenters in nature's great laboratory." A 
North Carolina planter gives an interesting account of cur- 
ing tobacco yellow. " Curing tobacco yellow, for which this 
section is so famous, is a very nice process and requires some 
experience, observation, and a thorough knowledge of the 
character and quality of the tobacco with which you have to 
deal, in order to insure uniform success. Much depends 
upon the character of the crop when taken from the hill. 
If it is of good size, well matured and of good yellowish 
color, there is necessarily but little difficulty in the operation. 
As soon as the tobacco is taken from the hill and housed, we 
commence with a low degree of heat, say 95'^ to 100° Fahr., 
' the yellowing ' or ' steaming ' process. This is the first and 
simplest part of the whole process, and requires from fifteen 
to thirty-six hours, according to the size and quality of the 



454 YELLOW TOBACCO. 

tobacco, and this degree of heat should be continued until 
the leaf opens a lemon color, and is nearly free from any 
green hue. When this point is reached, the heat should 
be gradually raised to 105* in order to commence drying the 
leaf, and here lies the whole difficulty in curing (I mean 
in drying the leaf). The last degree of heat indicated, 
should be continued five or six hours, when it should again 
be gradually raised to 110^, when it should be maintained 
at this point, until the tail or points of the leaves begin 
to curl and dry. Indeed it will probably be safest for begin- 
ners to continue this degree of heat until one-third of the 
leaf is dried. 

" The temperature may then be gradually increased to 115^, 
and kept for several hours at that point, until the leaf begins 
to rattle when shaken, then again raise the heat to 120*, at 
which point it should be continued until the leaf is dried, 
after which the temperature may be increased to 150* or 
160* to dry the stem and stalks ; the latter should be black- 
ened by the heat before the curing is complete. Ordinarily 
it requires from two and a half to five days to cure a barn 
of tobacco, dependent entirely upon the size and quality. 
Put seven or eight plants on each stick and place them eight 
inches apart on tier poles. In the yellowing process the door 
of the barn should be kept closed to exclude the air. 
When this point is reached for drying the leaf, the door may 
be opened occasionally, and kept open for twenty or thirty 
minutes at a time, especially if the tobacco gets into a " sweat," 
as it is called, or becomes damp and clammy. 

" The temperature is raised in the barn by cautiously add- 
ing coal from time to time to the fires, which should be 
placed in small piles on the floor, in rows, allowing about 
five feet between each pile, which should at first contain a 
double handful of coal. In adding coal, you will soon learn 
the quantity necessary to be applied by the effect produced. 
Avoid raising the heat hastily after the drying is commenced, 
lest the leaf should be scalded and reddened ; on the other 
hand, it should not be raised too slowly for fear of ' raising 
the grain,' or the leaf becoming spongy and dingy. Both 
extremes are to be avoided, and the skill required is attained 
only by experience and observation. We usually cut tobacco 
the latter part of the week, house it and suffer it to remain 
until the first of next week, that we may not violate the 
fourth commandment." 

In California tobacco is cured by the method known as 



THE " GULP PROCESS." 455 

the " Gulp process " from the name of its patentee. When 
the plant lies in the field, Mr. Gulp's peculiar process begins 
which is described as follows: 

" Tobacco had long been grown in Galifornia, even before 
Americans came. He had raised it as a crop for fifteen years ; 
and before he perfected his new process, he was able usually to 
select the best of his crop for smoking tobacco, and sold the 
remainder for sheep wash. One year, two millions of pounds 
were raised in the State, and as it was mostly sold for sheep 
wash, it lasted several years, and discouraged the growers. 
Tobacco always grew readily, but it was too rank and strong. 
They used Eastern methods, topping and suckering, and as the 
plant had here a very long season to grow and mature, the 
leaf was thick and very strong. The main features of the 
Gulp process are, he said, to let the tobacco, when cut, wilt 
on the field ; then take it at once to the tobacco house and 
pile it down, letting it heat on the piles to 100'^ for Havana. 
It must, he thinks, come to 100*, but if it rises to 102* it is 
ruined. Piling, therefore, requires great judgment. The 
tobacco houses are kept at a temperature of about 70* ; and late 
in the fall, to cure a late second or third crop they sometimes use 
a stove to maintain a proper heat in the house, for the tobacco 
must not lie in the pile without heating. When it has had 
its first sweat, it is hung up on racks; and here Mr. 
Gulp's process is peculiar. 

" He places the stalk between two battens, so that it sticks 
out horizontally from the frame; thus each leaf hangs 
independently from the stalk ; and the racks or frames are 
BO arranged that all the leaves on all the stalks have a separate 
access to the air. The tobacco houses are frame buildings, 
100x60 feet, with usually four rows of racks, and two gang- 
ways for working. On the rack the surface moisture dries 
from the leaf ; and at the proper time it is again piled, racked, 
and so on for three or even four times. The racks are of 
rough boards, and the floor of the houses is of earth. After 
piling and racking for three weeks, the leaves are stripped 
from the stalk and put into 'hands,' and they are then 
' bulked ' and lie thus about three months, when the tobacco 
is boxed. From the time of cutting, from four to six months 
are required to make the leaf ready for the manufacturer. 
" Piling " appears to be the most delicate part of the cure, 
and they have often to work all night to save tobacco that 
threatens to overheat." 



456 



CURING IN OTHER COUNTRIES. 



In Mexico the leaves are hung up on bast* strings, dried 
in the shade and then sent to the chief depots, where, when 
they have undergone fermentation, they are sorted, and tied 
up in bundles. In Persia, the plants are carried to the shed 
and heaped, and in four or five days the desired pale yellow 
color is further developed. The stalks and center stem of 
each leaf are now removed and thrown away, while the leaves 
are heaped together in the drying house for another three 
or four days, when they are fit for packing. 

In Turkey the bunches of leaves are exposed to the sun to 




ijTRIPPINU. 



dry, and some months' exposure is necessary before they are 
suflBcently matured for baling. Kain sets in at a later period, 
and the tobacco becoming moist and fit for handling, is thea 



•The Inner bark of the Hme-tree. 



STRIPPING. 



457 



removed from the threads, and made into bundles or " hands " 
of about sixty leaves each and tied around the stems. 

After the leaves are thoroughly cured they are in condition 
for 

STEIPPING. 

The leaves of the tobacco are easily affected by the humidity 
of the atmosphere and during damp weather every opportunity 
is improved by the grower for taking down the tobacco prepar- 
atory to stripping. After taking down from the poles the 
plants should be packed in order to keep moist until stripped. 
The tobacco should not be removed from the poles when it 
drips or the juice exudes from either the stalk or the leaves. 
If stripped in this condition the leaves are apt to stain and 
thus become unfit for wrappers. The operation of stripping 
consists in taking the leaves from the stalk and tying them in 
bundles or hands with a leaf around the base of the hand. 




Each " hand " or bunch should contain at least eight leaves 
and from that number to twelve. If the plants are large the 
leaves of one stalk will form a hand ; a poor leaf is used for 
binding as it can not be used for the same purpose as the 
leaves around which it is bound. 

The old planters of tobacco in Virginia called this operation 



458 ASSORTING. 

of taking off the leaves and tying them up " stripping and 
bundling " which is here described. 

" When the plants of tobacco which are thus hanging upon 
the sticks in the house have gone through the several stages 
of process before the time of stripping, and are deemed to be 
in case for the next operation, a rainy day (which is the most 
suitable) is an opportunity which is generally taken advantage 
of when the hands cannot be so well employed out of doors. 
The sticks containing the tobacco which may be suflSciently 
cured, are then taken down and drawn out of the plants. 
They are then taken one by one respectively, and the leaves 
being stripped from the stalk of the plant are rolled round 
the butts or thick ends of the leaves with one of the smallest 
leaves as a bandage, and thus made up into little bundles fit 
for laying into the cask for final packing. " 

Hazard gives the following method of assorting and strip- 
ping tobacco in Cuba: — 

" Among the Cubans, the leaves are divided into four 
classes : first, desechoy desecho limpio, which are those immedi- 
ately at the top of the plant, and which constitute the best 
quality, from the fact that they get more equally the benefit of 
the sun's rays by day and the dew by night ; second, desechito, 
which are the next to the above ; third, the libra, the inferior or 
small leaves about the top of the plant ; and fourth, the inju- 
riado, or those nearest the root. Of the injuriado there are 
three qualities ; the best is called injuriado de reposo, or 
*the picked over,' and the other two, firsts and seconds 
{primeros, sequndos). 

" Tobacco of the classes desechito and libra, of which the 
leaves are not perfect, is called injuriado bueno, while all the 
rest, of whatever quality, that is broken in such a manner as 
to be unfit for wrappers'are <i2ii)i^Qdiinjuriado malo. Amongst 
the trade in place of the above names, the different qualities 
are simply designated by numbers. " 

Meyer, a German writer who resided several years in Cuba, 
gives another classification, making ten classes altogether, 
while Hazard mentions only four general classes. 

After the leaves are stripped from the stalk the process 

known as 

ASSORTING 

commences. Assorting tobacco is doing up in hands the vari- 
ous qualities and keeping them separate. In the Connecticut 



SHADING. 459 

valley the growers make usually but two kinds or qualities 
excepting only when the crop is poor when three qual- 
ities are made, viz : Wrappers, Seconds, and Fillers. The 
Wrappers are the largest and finest leaves on the plant and 
should be free from holes and sweat as well as green and 
white veins. The leaves selected for this quality come from 
the middle and even the top leaves of the plant. The 
Seconds are made up of leaves not good enough for Wrappers 
and too good for Fillers. Such leaves sometimes are worm- 
eaten and of various colors on the same leaf — one part dark 
and another light. The fillers are the poorest quality of leaves 
to be found on the plants, and consist of the " sand "or ground 
leaves, one or two to each plant. Some of our largest growers 
in assorting the leaves keep each color by itself, an operation 
known as 

SHADING. 

This is a very delicate operation and requires a good eye 
for colors as well as a correct judgment in regard to the 
quality of the leaf. This mode of assorting colors in stripping 
is similar to that of shading cigars, in which the utmost care 
is taken to keep the various colors and shades by themselves. 
In shading the wrappers only are so assorted, and may be 
" run into " two or three shades depending on the number of 
shades or colors of the leaf. The better way is to make only 
two qualities of the wrappers in shading — viz.,light and dark 
cinnamon " selections." Shading tobacco does not imply that 
it is carried to its fullest extent in point of color as in shading 
cigars, but simply keeping those general colors by themselves 
like hght and dark brown leaves. Cutting tobaccos before 
being used are subjected to a process known as 

STEMMING. 

Tatham gives the following account of the process of stem- 
ming in "Virginia a century ago : — 

" Stemming tobacco is the act of separating the largest 
stems or fibres from the web of the leaf with adroitness and 
facility, so that the plant may be nevertheless capable of 



460 



STEMMING. 



package, and fit for a foreign market. It is practised in cases 
where the malady termed the fire, or other casual misfortune 
during the growth of the plant, may have rendered it doubt- 
ful in the opinion of the planter whether something or other 
which he may have observed during the growth of his crop, 
or in the unfavorable temperature of the seasons by which it 




hath been matured does not hazard too much in packing the 
web with a stem which threatens to decay. To avoid the 
same species of risk, stemming is also practised in cases where 
the season when it becomes necessary to finish packing for 
a market is too unfavorable to put up the plant in leaf in the 
usual method ; or when the crop may be partially out of case. 
Besides the operation of stemming in the hands of the crop- 
master, there are instances where this partial process is 
repeated in the public warehouses; of which I shall treat 
under a subsequent head. 

" The operation of stemming is performed by taking the 
leaf in one hand, and the end of the stem in the other, iu 
such a way as to cleave it with the grain ; and there is an 
expertness to be acquired by practice, which renders it as 
easy as to separate the bark of a willow, although those 
unaccustomed to it find it difiicult to stem a single plant. 
When the web is thus separated from the stem, it is made dp 



PACKING. 



461 



into bundles in the same way as in the leaf, and is laid in 
bulk for farther process. The stems have been generally- 
thrown away, or burnt with refuse tobacco for the 
purpose of soap-ashes; but the introduction of snuff-mills 
has, within a few years back, found a more economical use 
for them." 

As soon as the tobacco has been stripped it is ready for 

PACKING. 

It is necessary to pack the " hands " after stripping in order 
to keep it moist, or in nearly the same condition as when 
stripped. Select a cool place, not too dry or too damp, but 
one where if properly protected, the tobacco will remain 
moist. It should be packed loosely or compact, according as 




the hands are moist or dry. It may be packed in the center 
of the floor so that it may be examined from either side, or 
against the sides of the packing house, as may be thought 
best. Hand the tobacco to the packer, who presses the hands 
firmly with his knees and hands, laying the tobacco in 
two tiers and keeping the pile at about the same height until 



462 MISSISSIPPI GARRETS. 

all is packed. If possible pack all together, that is, each kind 
by itself, as it is better to have the wrappers or fillers all 
together rather than in several places, as the moisture is 
retained better than when it is packed in small piles or heaps. 
Use in packing a plank or board, placing it against the 
front of the tier and bring the ends of the hands up against it. 
This will make the tobacco look much better and also render 
the process of packing firmer. 

The tobacco may be packed any height or length desired, 
according to the quantity, but usually from three to four feet 
high will be found to be convenient while the length may 
be proportioned to the height or not. Tobacco may be 
packed by the cord or half cord so as to be able to judge 
of the quantity — good large wrappers averaging a ton to the 
cord. Seconds and Fillers will not contain as many pounds to 
the cord as wrappers. After the tobacco is packed, cover 
first with boards — planed ones are preferable, — or even shing- 
les — and press firmly, especially if the tobacco is dry, then cover 
with blankets or any kind of covering, adding plank or pieces 
of timber if additional pressure is needed. It can now 
remain packed until sold or cased, and will hardly need 
to be examined unless packed while very damp or kept 
packed until warm weather. 

"Wailes says of planting by the early planters of tobacco in 
Mississippi : — 

" The larger planters packed it in the usual way in hogs- 
heads. Much of it, however, was put up in carrets, as they 
were called, resembling in size and form two small sugar- 
loafs united at the larger ends. The stemmed tobacco was 
laid smoothly together in that form coated with wrappers of 
the extended leaf, enveloped in a cloth, and then firmly 
compressed by a cord wrapped around the parcel, and which 
was suffered to remain until the carret acquired the necessary 
dryness and solidity, when together with the surrounding 
cloth, it was removed, and strips of lime-bark were bound 
around it at proper distances, in such a manner as to secure 
it from unwrapping and losing its proportions." 

In Turkey, after the tobacco is made into bundles or hands, 
it is piled against the walls inside the dwelling rooms and a 



CASING. 463 

carefully graduated pressure put upon it until ready for 
baling. In Java, when the tobacco is ready to pack the leaf is 
examined, and if found quite brown, it is tightly pressed and 
packed up either in boxes or matting for exportation, or in 
the bark of the tree plantain, for immediate sale. 
The next process on the tobacco plantation is that of 

PRIZING, CASING, AND BALING. 

The term prizing originated in Virginia, and as performed 
by the early planters, is thus described by an old writer on 
tobacco culture : — 

" Prizing, in the sense in which it is to be taken here is, 
perhaps, a local word, which the Virginians may claim the 
credit of creating, or at least of adopting ; it is at best tech- 
nical, and must be defined to be the act of pressing or 
squeezing the article which is to be packed into any package, 
by means of certain levers, screws, or other mechanical 
powers ; so that the size of the article may be reduced in 
stowage, and the air expressed so as to render it less pregnable 
by outward accident, or exterior injury, than it would be in 
its natural condition. 

" The operation of prizing, however, requires the combi- 
nation of judgment and experience; for the commodity may 
otherwise become bruised by the mechanic action, and this 
will have an efiect similar to that of prizing in too high case, 
which signifies that degree of moisture which produces all 
the risks of fermentation, and subjects the plant to be shat- 
tered into rags. The ordinary apparatus for prizing consists 
of the prize beam, the platform, the blocks, and the cover. 
The prize beam is a lever formed of a young tree or sapling, 
of about ten inches diameter at the butt or thicker end, and 
about twenty or twenty -five feet in length ; but in crops 
where many hands are employed, and a sufficient force 
always near for the occasional assistance of managing a more 
weighty leverage, this beam is often made of a larger tree, 
hewn on two of its sides to about six inches thick, and of the 
natural width, averaging twelve or fourteen inches. The 
thick end of this beam is so squared as to form a tenon, 
which is fitted into a mortise that is dug through some 
growing tree, or other, of those which generally abound con- 
venient to the tobacco house, something more than five feet 
above the platform. Close to the root of this tree, and 



464 



OLD STYLE. 



immediately under the most powerful point of the lever, a 
platform or floor of plank is constructed for the hogshead to 
stand upon during the operation of prizing. This must be 
laid upon a solid foundation, levelled, upon hewn pieces of 




PRIZING IN OLDEN TIMES. 



wood as sleepers ; and so grooved and perforated that any 
wet or rain which may happen to fall upon the platform may 
run off without injuring the tobacco. Blocks of wood are 
prepared about two feet in length, and about three or four 
inches in diameter, with a few blocks of greater dimensions, 
for the purpose of raising the beam to a suitable purchase ; 
and a movable roof constructed of clap boards nailed upon 
pairs of light rafters, of sufficient size to shelter the platform 
and hogshead, is made ready to place astride of the beam, as 
a saddle is put upon a horse's back, in order to secure the 
tobacco from the weather while it is subjected to this tedious 
part of the process. 

" That part of the apparatus which is designed to manage 
and give power to the lever is variously constructed : in some 
instances two beams of timber about six feet long, and 
squared to four by six inches, are prepared ; through these, 
by means of an auger hole, a sapling of hickory or other 
tough wood, is respectively passed ; and the root thereof 
being formed like the head of a pin to prevent its slipping 
through the hole, the sapling is bent like a bow, and the 
other end is passed through the same piece of wood in a 
reversed direction, in which position it is wedged. These 
two bows are in this manner hung by the sapling loops upon 



RESISTANCE TO DAMPNESS. 465 

the end of the prize beam or lever ; and loose planks or slabs 
of about five or six feet long being laid upon these suspended 
pieces of timber, a kind of hanging floor or platform is 
constructed, upon which weights are designed to act as in a 
scale. A pile of large stones are then carted to the place, 
and a sufficient number of these are occasionally placed upon 
this hanging platform, until the lever has obtained precisely 
the power which the crop master wishes to give it by this 
regulating medium. 

" The prizing or packing by the old planters must have been 
a tedious affair, and far different from the quick work made 
by the screw-press now owned by all well to-do planters. 
The size of the hogsheads containing the tobacco was regu- 
lated by law to the standard of four feet six inches in length, 
but the shape of the cask varied according to the fancy of 
the cooper, or roughness of his work. At this period (a 
century ago), the tobacco hogshead was made most generally 
of white oak ; but Spanish oak, and red oak, were sometimes 
used, when the usual kind could not be so readily commanded. 
Now the hogsheads are made of pine, but are nearly as rough 
as those made by the colonial growers. 

" Tobacco, if well packed, and prized duly, will resist the 
water for a surprising length of time. An instance is recorded 
in strong proof of this, which occurred at Kingsland upon 
James river in Virginia, where tobacco, which had been 
carried off by the great land floods in 1771, was found in a 
large raft of drift wood in which it had lodged when the 
warehouses at Richmond were swept away by the overflowing 
of the freshets ; an inundation which had happened about 
twenty years before this cask was found." 

Tatham gives the following account of a similar instance : — 

" On the sixth of October, 1782, 1 myself was one of a party 
who were shipwrecked upon the coast of New Jersey, in 
America, on board the brigantine Maria, Captain McAulay, 
from Richmond in Virginia, and laden with tobacco. Several 
hogsheads, which were saved from the wreck were brought 
round to Stillwill's landing upon Great Egg harbor; and 
amongst them some which had lost the headings of the cask, 
and the hoops and staves, were so much shattered by the beat- 
ing of the surf, that it was not thought worth while to land 
them, and they were just tumbled out of the lighter upon the 
beach, and left to remain where the tide constantly flowed 
over them for several weeks, so that the outside was com- 
pletely rotten, and they had the appearance of heaps of 
> 30 



466 PRIZING.' 

manure. In this very bad condition, I still persisted in trying 
to save what I supposed might remain entire in the interior 
of the lump, and at last prevailed so far over the ignorance 
and prejudice by which I had been ridiculed, as to effect an 
overhauling and repacking of this damaged commodity and to 
save a proportion thereof very far beyond what I myseK had 
expected. Some of the heart of this was so highly improved, 
that I have seldom seen tobacco equal to it for chewing, or for 
immediate manufacture ; and what was repacked was sold to a 
tobacconist in Water Street, Philadelphia, at a price so little 
reduced below the ordinary market, that the man very frankly 
told me, that if he could have had the whole drowned tobacco in 
a short time after it was saved from the wreck, he would have 
made no difference in the price but would rather have prefer- 
red it for immediate manufacture, as it would have spared him 
some little labor in a part of the process. " 

Prizing tobacco applies to the packing of tobacco in hogs- 
heads all such leaf being used for cutting purposes, cigar leaf 
being either cased or baled. In some sections about 800 
pounds net is packed in one parcel, while in others 1000 
pounds and sometimes even 1500 and 1800 pounds. " Seed 
leaf " tobacco in this country is all packed in cases instead of 
hogsheads, each case containing from 375 to 400 pounds net. 
It is necessary that all kinds of tobacco should be pressed in 
some kind of package before it is ready to be manufactured. 
There are exceptions, however, as in the case of Latakia 
tobacco, which is simply hung in the peasant's huts through the 
winter to be fumigated and to acquire the peculiar flavor this 
tobacco has. Tobacco in good condition to case must be damp 
enough to bear the pressure in casing without breaking and 
crumbling, while it must not be too moist or it will rot in the 
case. The number of pounds to the case will vary according 
to the size of the leaf, as well as the condition of the tobacco. 

When ready to case the " hands " are packed in the case, 
laying them in two tiers. The case being nearly full the 
contents are then subjected to a strong pressure until it is 
reduced to one half its bulk, then another layer is placed in 
the case and again pressed, and succeeded by as many as are 
required to fill the case. The tobacco should be packed evenly 
in layers with the ends of the. leaves touching one another or 



MARKING. 



467 



even crossing, and the whole mass presenting a smooth and 
even appearance. The " wrappers " should be cased by them- 
selves and " the seconds " and " fillers " together or separate 
at the option of the packer. The tobacco should be cased 




TOBACCO PKESS. 



hard so that the mass will rise but little when the pressure 
is removed. As the fillers are usually dry they must be 
moistened before casing or subjected to a very strong press- 
ure. After packing the cases should be turned on their sides, 
and the grower's name marked on each case, also the kind of 
tobacco, whether wrappers or fillers, together with the number 
of pounds and the weight of the case. This is necessary to 
ascertain the quality of leaf produced by each grower, as well 
as to protect the buyer against all fraud in packing and casing. 
The cases may be piled one upon another, but should 
be kept from the rays of the sun and in a dry room, so that 
the sweating of the leaf may be sufficient to fit it for use. 
It is necessary that the season during sweating should be 
warm, in order to secure a good sweat. It will commence 
to " warm up " sometime in April or May, and will be ready 
to sample or uncase about the first of September. After 
" going through a sweat," the leaf takes on a darker color, 
and loses the rank flavor* which it had before. It is better 
to let the tobacco dry ofi" befdre being used or taken from 
the case. " Baling " is packing tobacco in small bundles or 
packages containing from one hundred to two hundred pounds, 



468 BALING. 

and is the manner of putting up tobacco for export in Cuba, 
Paraguay, Algiers, Hungary, Mexico, Syria, the Philippines, 
China, Sumatra, Japan, Java, Turkey, and in some other 
tobacco-growing countries. In Cuba after being formed into 
hands or " gcuvillos " and four of these tied together with strips 
of palm-leaf so as to constitute a " manoja,^^ fifty or eighty 
of them are packed together, making what is called a " tercio " 
or bale, the average weight of which is two hundred pounds. 
Hazard says of the number of pounds produced on the vegas : 

"A caballeria of thirty -three acres of ground produces 
about nine thousand pounds of tobacco, made up in about 
the following proportions : four hundred and fifty of desechoy 
or best ; one thousand eight hundred pounds desechito^ 
or seconds ; two thousand two hundred and fifty pounds of 
libra, or thirds ; and four thousand five hundred pounds of 
injuriado. From these figm'es, taking the bale at one hund- 
red pounds, and the average price of the tobacco at twenty 
dollars per bale, (though this is a low estimate, for the crops 
of some of the vegas are sold as high, sometimes, as four 
hundred dollars per bale,) an approximate idea may be formed 
of the profit of a large plantation in a good year, when the 
crops are satisfactory." 

In Mexico, after being baled, the tobacco is sent to the 
government factories, where it is not weighed until two 
months afterwards. The price is high, varying from twelve 
to twenty-eight dollars per crate ; and is paid in ten monthly 
installments. In Persia, when the tobacco is fit for packing, 
the leaves are carefully spread on each other, and formed 
into cakes four or five feet round, and three to four inches 
thick, care being taken not to break or injure the leaves. 
Bags of strong cloth, thin and open at the sides, are provided, 
into which the cakes are pressed strongly down on each other. 
When the bags are filled they are placed in a separate drying 
house, and are turned every day. Water is then sprinkled 
on the cakes, if required, to prevent them from breaking. 
The leaf is valued for being thick, tough, of a uniform light 
yellow color, and of an agreeable aromatic smell. 

In Turkey, the tobacco after remaining in the dwelling- 
room of the house a sufficient time, is ready for baling. The 



CERTIFICATES. 469 

bales average in weight about forty oques (110 English pounds). 
The covering of the bales is a sort of netting made by the 
peasants from goat's hair ; it is elastic and of great strength. 
Vamberry says of packing tobacco in European Turkey : 

" The tobacco is packed in small packets {bog tche), and only 
after it has lain for years in the warehouses of the tobacco mer- 
chants, is it honored by the connoisseurs of Stamboul with 
the title of ' Aala Gobeck.' This sort of finely-cut tobacco 
resembling the finest silk, is held in equally high estimation 
in the palaces of the Grand Seignior, in the seraglio, and in 
the divan of the sublime Porte, where the privy council 
debate the most important affairs of the empire, under the 
soothing influence of its aromatic vapors." 

In St. Domingo and the United States of Colombia, South 
America, the bales are called Serous, and in Holland and 
Germany, Packages. Tobacco is sent to market in bales of 
various sizes and made of various materials. In Cuba, the 
tobacco is bound with palm leaves. In South America it i8 
packed in ox hides. From the East it comes in camel's 
hair sacks or " netting made from goat's hair," while from 
Persia, tobacco is exported in sacks of strong cloth. Manilla 
tobacco is shipped in bales containing four hundred pounds 
net. It is covered first with bass and then with sacking, 
made of Indian grass tied around with ratan. Each bale con- 
tains a printed statement, of which the following is a copy : 

PROVIN^CIA DE CAGAYAN, 

PAKTiDo DE CFFA. Cosecha dc 186 . 

Clas de conteine 40 manos de tabaco 

aforado por la junta de aforo y enfardelado 
por el que subscribe. Tuguegarao de 
de 186 . 

El Gohernadorcillo caudillo. Y." B." 

Vicente Lasan. El Interventor de aforo. 

The tobacco plant while growing is easily affected by a 
wet season, while it is also liable to injury by the opposite 
extreme of heat or drought. If a drought occurs soon 



470 



FIRING. 



after the plants are transplanted, their growth and devel- 
opment is greatly hindered. When, however, the plants 
are nearly grown, a severe drought affects the plants but 
little, the large palm-like leaves forming a kind of canopy 
and keeping the earth moist and cool. During a wet season, 
and sometimes when the plants have been set in damp soil, 
they are affected by " brown rust," or, as it is called at the 
South, 

FIRING. 
It is supposed to be caused by very damp weather, and is 
much dreaded by all growers of the weed, as it is sometimes 
quite common, and on low soil affects the crop to a consider- 
able extent. It spots the leaf with hard brown spots that 
often fall out, producing holes fatal to the value of the crop. 

The lower leaves on the 
plant are more likely to 
be injured than those 
higher on the stalk. 
The spots vary in size ; 
sometimes they are as 
large as a three cent 
piece, but more fre- 
quently about the size 
of a small pearl button. 
At the South, rust or 
" firing " is much more 
common than in the 
Connecticut valley, and 
often whole fields are 
badly affected by the 
FIRING. malady. Some seasons 

hardly any rust can 
be discovered on the leaves, and if any spots are found 
they are fixed and do not spread. 

Small plants are more liable to be injured than large ones, 
and not unfrequently nearly every leaf is covered with the 
spots. Many theories have been advanced in regard to the 





WHITE RUST. 471 

cause of rust and how to prevent it. It usually occurs just 
before, or after, topping, and if the plants are ripe enough to 
harvest, they should be cut before the rust spreads to any 
great extent. It makes its appearance very suddenly, and if 
the weather be favorable (damp), spreads rapidly, often in a 
few days injuring the plants to a great extent. There are 
two varieties of rust or " tiring," brown and white ; and 
while the former is dreaded by the grower, as it injures the 
quahty of the plant, the other is regarded with special favor, 
as it gives value to the leaf. 

The white rust,* as it is termed, is a small white speck 
(often noticed on cigars), making its appearance on the leaves 
of the plant towards the latter part of its growth, and usually 
found on the top and middle leaves. It is usually found on 
the best, and more frequently on light than dark tobacco. 
Unlike the brown rust, the white does not fall out, but is as 
firm in its place as any part of the leaf ; sometimes the spots 
are as white as chalk, and again they will be of a yellowish 
shade, though lighter in color than brown rust. The lighter 
the color the better their effect on the leaf upon which they 
are found. Leaves thus " spotted " make the finest of wrap- 
pers, and light-colored leaf thus affected brings the very 
highest price. It is well known to manufacturers of cigars 
that such leaves burn well, and almost invariably make a 
light ash. Good judges of cigars always pick for those thus 
affected, and watch with interest the ash of the cigar, noting 
the color as well as the flavor. 

Some seasons this kind of rust is quite common, and it is 
supposed to be caused in the same way as the brown, although 
there are some growers who think that it is produced by 
altogether different causes. There is, however, a marked 
difference in the appearance of the leaves thus spotted ; the 
white rust is not usually as thick upon the leaf, and is more 
generally found along the sides of the leaf, while the brown 
rust is found more in the center than along the sides. Tobacco 
of a light cinnamon color thus "marked" is considered 

'Florid* tobacco le noted for tbe wbite rust found on the lesTes. 



472 SEED PLANTS. 

the most valuable, and could the planter obtain such a crop 
at option, he could realize the very highest price for it. 
Large growers who find much of their tobacco " spotted " in 
this manner, would do well to keep such leaves by themselves, 
and sell direct to the manufacturer. Both kinds of rust are 
more commonly seen on the plants during a wet than a dry 
season, and particularly if the plants have grown rapidly 
during the latter part of the time. 

Formerly buyers of leaf tobacco were more interested in 
leaf of this description than now ; and some of them, more 
anxious than others, made liberal offers to any grower of 
tobacco who could ascertain how such tobacco could be 
obtained. It is hardly probable that any method of culture 
could be devised so as to obtain such leaf; it seems to be a 
freak of nature, depending somewhat on the soil as well aa 
the humidity of the atmosphere, and without doubt is beyond 
the control of the grower. Various theories propounded 
and experiments tried have not met with any success that we 
are aware of. Some growers are of the opinion that light 
manure spread on moist soil will tend to produce leaf affected 
with white rust, while others affirm that such leaf is common 
on high ground when manured with light fertilizers. It is a 
matter of doubt whether such leaf can be obtained by any 
preparation of soil, or any system of cultivation whatever. 

SEED PLANTS. 

The selection of large, well-formed plants for the maturing 
of the seeds, is of more importance than most growers are 
aware of-* Not only should the altitude of the plant be 
taken into account, but also the size and texture of the leaf. 

If a variety foreign to the soil (on which it is cultivated) 
is grown, then particular pains should be taken to select 
seed plants resembling those cultivated in its native home. 

In cultivating foreign varieties, even the first season plants 
may be seen that do not resemble the majority, but are 

*Llancourt says of the selection of seed plants In Virginia:—" The seed for the next yew 
ia obtained from forty to fifty Btalks per acre, which the cultivator leta run up au hlgtiM 
they will grow, without bruising their heads." 



HAVANA TOBACCO. 



473 




seemingly trying to accommodate themselves to the soil and 
climate, and in consequence resemble in a measure the variety 
commonly cultivated. Growers of Havana tobacco in the 
Connecticut valley 
can testify to this, and 
especially to the in- 
creased size of the 
plants. There are, 
however, growers of 
Havana tobacco, who 
claim that it will 
never deteriorate in 
quality, and that seed 
from Havana is not 
required in order to 
secure the delightful 
flavor of the Vuelta 
de Ahajo leaf. Our 
experience is the re- 
verse of this, and ap- 
plies more directly to the flavor of the leaf than the size, 
color, or texture. In the Connecticut valley Havana leaf 
retains in a remarkable degree the texture and color of leaf, 
but not the flavor. Fresh or new seed is required from time 
to time. Sieckle says on the choice of seed : — 

" The selection of seed is one of the principal conditions 
for raising good tobacco, especially when intended for the 
manufacture of cigars. In the United States now and then 
Havana seeds are planted. The tobacco raised therefrom 
generally resembles the real Havana in shape and color of 
leaves. But in order to reproduce approximately also the 
fine taste and flavor of genuine Havana tobacco, it would be 
required to impart to the soil exactly the components which 
constitute the famous tobacco-ground, viz.: the soil of the 
above-mentioned Vuelta de Abajo in Cuba. We say approx- 
imately, because the climate is a thing that can be neither 
transplanted nor fully equaled by artificial means. Havana 
seed propagated in the United States usually degenerates 
very soon, even in the course of two or three years. In 



SPANISH SKKD TOBACCO. 



474 MATURING OF SEEDS, 

other countries the experiment has been made to acclimate 
foreign seeds, for instance, Havana, by crossing, respectively 
changing the sexes and giving the male influence now to the 
foreign, then to the home plant." 

In the Connecticut valley the cultivation of Havana tobacco 
is increasing year by year, and it promises to become the 
principal variety cultivated. All of the leading qualities of 
Connecticut seed leaf, such as color, strength, and texture, 
are preserved, while the flavor is as fine as that of much that 
is imported. The plants selected for seed should be allowed 
to fully ripen, when the leaves may be stripped from the 
stalks, that the capsules may receive all the strength of the 
growing and maturing plants. The seed plants should be 
left standing some six or eight weeks after the other plants 
have been harvested. If the nights are very cold and frosty, 
the top of the plants may be covered with a light cloth or 
paper to protect the seed buds. 

When the capsules are of full size and brown in color, the 
top may be broken ofi" and hung up in a dry, cool place to 
cure, after which the seeds should be taken from the capsules. 
To do this, the end of the seed buds may be cut, when most 
of the seeds will fall out if the buds are fully ripe and dry. 
A southern planter gives the following account of the curing 
and management of seed plants : — 

" There are four classes of tobacco grown in Virginia and 
North Carolina, viz.: Shipping, filling, smoking, and wrap- 
ping ; and it is important that planters desiring to raise either 
one of these should choose the kind of seed best adapted to 
each particular class. The Pryor makes the heaviest, richest 
shipping, and can only be grown to perfection on alluvial or 
heavily manured lands. The Frederick or Maryland grows 
larger, but is not so rich and waxy. The Oronoko is far 
preferable for fillers, smokers or wrappers, being sweeter in 
flavor, finer in fibre and texture, and more easily cured 
yellow. This is the kind best adapted to our gray soils, 
giving best returns. The product is not so large as on black 
or brown lands, yet with skill in curing and management, 
the difference in product is more than made up in quality. 

" The Oronoko, therefore, is the only kind suited to our 
gray lands, and of this there are several varieties, the two 



ORONOKO TOBACCO. 475 

most in favor being the yellow Oronoko, and the Gooch or 
Pride of Granville. The first is the kind that gave character 
to the Caswell (North Carolina) yellow tobacco more than 
twenty years ago, and is still preferred by a very large 
number of planters who grow the finest yellow smokers and 
wrappers. The latter is preferred in Granville county, 
North Carolina, that produces the finest yellow tobacco 
grown on this continent, or, perhaps, in the world. This 
latter is clearly an Oronoko tobacco, very much resembling 
the former, except that the leaf grows rather broader, and by 
some is considered sweeter. These two kinds have been 
grown with special reference to their adaptation to producing 
the finest quality of wrappers, smokers, and fillers. I am 
satisfied that the art of curing and management have not only 
been very far advanced toward scientific perfection, but that 
in perfecting the kinds of seed grown much improvement has 
been made. For instance, in the saving of seed, by adopting 
the plan of turning out the forwardest plants growing in the 
best soil, and afterwards observing to cut off all the heads of 
plants that ripen up coarse, narrow or ill-shaped, or of a 
green color on the hill, and saving only those heads that ripen 
yellow in color and of a smooth and fine texture, much has 
been done to improve the kind. Besides, the most important 
point in the saving of tobacco seed is to cut off all the lateral 
shoots, leaving only three crown shoots to perfect seed, 
thereby securing larger pods and more perfect seed that 
always ripen in good time, and are more reliable for seed 
beds and the production of early, vigorous plants. 

"By following this mode of saving seed with special 
reference to the growth of a particular class of tobacco, in a 
few years the seed is not only greatly improved, but as like 
begets like in the vegetable as in the animal kingdom, 
becomes sui generis — the first of its species. The writer can 
bear testimony to the above facts and desires that others may 
profit thereby. Where any plant attains its highest perfec- 
tion, there is the place to secure the best seed. • The home of 
the tobacco plant is in Virginia and North Carolina, and the 
growth and perfection of the kinds here cultivated have 
reached a point unattained any where else. The West and 
South would do well to procure their seed from us, and then 
gave and propagate after the instructions above given." 

SECOND GROWTH. 
The first account we find of raising a second crop of tobacco 



476 SECOND GROWTH. 

on the original field, is found in the earlj history of the 
Virginia colony ; who, not satisfied with the vast amount 
cultivated in the usual manner, allowed a second growth to 
spring up from the parent stalk and thus obtained two crops 
from the same field in one year. The inferior quality of this 
growth at length caused its prohibition by law, as described 
elsewhere in this work. Of late, however, this "new 
departure " in tobacco culture seems to have attracted some 
attention, particularly in the Southern States, where numer- 
ous experiments have been made, and in some instances with 
complete success. In Mexico and also in Louisiana and Cali- 
fornia, two and even three crops are gathered, thus adding 
to the profit of the grower, but hardly to the fertility of the 
tobacco fields. Whatever the fertility of the tobacco field 
may be, or the care and attention given to the second crop by 
the planter, it can not equal the first crop, and must from the 
nature of the case be quite inferior in size, texture, and flavor 
of leaf. 

Doubtless the varieties grown in the tropics will be much 
finer than the varieties grown in a more temperate region. 
There are many reasons why a second and third crop can not 
be equal to the first in the qualities necessary for fine leafy 
tobacco. In the first place, the soil will hardly produce a 
second crop of the size and texture of leaf that will compare 
with the first growth : the leaves will be small and resemble 
the top leaves of the original plant rather than the large, 
well-formed leaves of the center. Again, the season will 
hardly be favorable (unless in the tropics), for a second 
growth, which has much to do with the quality of the leaf 
and which alone ensures large, well-matured plants. 

In the Connecticut valley but one crop can be grown of 
seed leaf, and even this when planted late is frequently 
overtaken by the " frost king " whose cold breath strikes a 
chill to the heart of the tobacco grower who has been so 
unfortunate as to have but a few plants ; especially if his 
fields were " set " late in the season, or with " spindling " or 
"long shank plants " which come forward slowly and forbid 



EXPERIMENTS. 477 

all thought of a second growth, and eometimes give small 
hopes of even the first. 

In Virginia and North Carolina the experiment has been 
tried of covering the stumps or trunk of the plants with 
straw, followed by plowing on both sides of the rows, thereby 
covering them to a depth of several inches, in which condition 
they are left until spring, when the covering is removed and 
the suckers or sprouts shoot forth and grow with great 
rapidity. This novel experiment may succeed so far as the 
growth and maturing of the plants is concerned, but will 
hardly add to the reputation of " Virginia's kingly plant " or 
to the profit of the growers, as the product must necessarily 
be small if the labor of transplanting is avoided. 

Beyond all question, experiments with the growth and 
culture of the tobacco plant are among the most interesting 
and valuable, and afibrd the planter the most pleasure and 
instruction of all similar trials with the products of the 
vegetable kingdom. These experiments at once develop 
not only the rare qualities of the plant, but its various forms 
and habit of growth. They show as well as its adaptation to 
all countries and climes, and the preservation of its qualities 
when grown in regions far remote from its native home. 
The florist finds no more pleasure in the cultivation of the 
rarest exotic than the tobacco planter in testing some new 
variety of tobacco, and noting its varied qualities and adap- 
tation to his fields. By trying new varieties, some of the 
finest qualities of the plant have been developed, and many 
other of its excellences still further advanced. In the United 
States numerous trials and experiments are constantly being 
made to still further perfect the various kinds already culti- 
vated, as well as to test other varieties and note their qualities 
and adaptation to the soil. Already far advanced, the 
culture of the plant has not yet reached its highest point. 
The adaptation, soil, and fertilizers, are now attracting much 
attention, and further study of these elements promises to 
" bring out " qualities of leaf hitherto overlooked, or at least 
but partially developed. 




CHAPTER XIY. 

THE PRODUCTION, COMMEKCE AND MANUEACTUEE OP TOBACCO. 

'EW comparatively of the users or even of the 
growers and manufacturers of tobacco, are aware of the 
vast amount cultivated, manufactured and used . Many- 
suppose that its cultivation is confined to the United 
States and a few of the West India Islands, having no idea 
of the large quantities grown in Europe, Asia and Africa 
and the islands of the East India Archipelago. The Spaniards 
first began the cultivation of the plant on the Island of St. 
Domingo^ afterwards extending it to Trinidad, the coast 
of South America, Mexico and the Philippine Islands. In 
Portugal the cultivation commenced about 1575-80, and 
continued some years. The Dutch a little later, began the 
production of tobacco in the East Indies, and in connection 
with the Spaniards and Portuguese were the only cultivators 
of tobacco until the English commenced its growth in 
Virginia in 1616. 

/' The first production in St. Domingo by the Spaniards was 
sometime previous to 1535, and the island has continued to 
produce the great staple until now/' In Trinidad, however, 
a finer article was yielded, and its cultivation became more 
general here until the Spaniards began to plant it in Cuba in 
1580. From the West Indies, South America and the East 
Indies, Europe raised its supply of tobacco untU the English 
colonists commenced its cultivation in Yirginia. The Span- 
iards and Portuguese at first controlled the trade in tobacco, 
and extorted most fabulous prices for it. As soon, however, 
as the Dutch and English began to cultivate it and receive it 

478 



EARLY HISTORY OF TOBACCO. 479 

from their colonies the price gradually fell while the demand 
and consumption for it increased in proportion to the falling 
off of prices. From the island of Trinidad, Europe received its 
finest tobacco, and it continued to maintain its reputation as 
such until that variety known as Varinas tobacco from South 
America appeared ; this variety attracted the attention of 
European buyers and consumers, from its superiority in 
flavor and appearance which it has maintained for more 
than two hundred and fifty years. 

In South America, the cultivation of tobacco took its rise 
in Venezuela, Brazil and Colombia. The varieties there 
produced had acquired an established reputation as early as 
1600, together with St. Lucia, Philippine and Margarita 
tobaccos. Early in the Seventeenth Century, the Dutch 
became the great producers and importers into Europe, and 
the growths of their colonies continued to furnish a large 
proportion of the quantity used until English colonial tobacco 
made its appearance from Virginia. 

The Plymouth and London companies from its first appear- 
ance in their markets, saw its vast importance as an article 
of agriculture and commerce, and in twenty years afterthe first 
planting of it, began to reap rich returns from its sale and pro- 
duction. From this time forward, not only in America, but 
in Europe and Asia, its cultivation spread among other 
nations until at length it has become one of the great sources 
of revenue of almost every country, and a leading product of 
nearly every clime. The islands of St. Domingo, Trinidad, St. 
Lucia and Martinique, do not produce as large quantities of 
tobacco as formerly ; its cultivation in the West Indies being 
now confined chiefly to the island of Cuba. 

This island produces at the present time the finest cigar 
leaf of the West Indies, which is considered by many as the 
best grown. The value of the annual product of Cuba is 
estimated at $20,000,000, nearly as much as that of the entire 
United States. Brazil, Colombia, Venezuela, and Paraguay, 
which are the tobacco-producing countries of South America, 
furnish Europe with a large amount of leaf tobacco. In 



480 COMMERCE IN TOBACCO. 

Brazil according to Scully it " occupies the fourth place in 
the exports " and is extensively cultivated in various parts 
of the empire. In Venezuela it is an important article of 
agriculture, and the product is of fine quality and in good 
repute in Europe. Colombia has long been noted for the 
amount and excellence of its tobacco ; its various growths 
are fine in all respects and are among the finest cigar tobaccos 
grown. In Paraguay large quantities of excellent cigar 
tobacco are raised, much of which is used in various parts of 
South America, the remainder going to Europe. 

All of the tobacco of South America is unrivaled in flavor 
and is well adapted for the manufacture of cigars. In 
Mexico, tobacco is raised to some extent, particularly in the 
GuK States, where it develops remarkably and is of excellent 
quality both in texture and flavor. Mexico is doubtless as 
well adapted for tobacco as any country in the world, and if 
certain restrictions* were removed, its culture would increase 
and the demand would cause its extensive production. In 
the Central American States, some tobacco is cultivated, but 
not to the extent that is warranted by the demand or the 
adaptation of the soil. Some parts of the States, especially of 
Honduras, are well adapted for the production of the very 
finest leaf. As it is but little is grown ; hardly any being 
exported to Europe. JAmerica is the native home of the 
tobacco plant, and in the United States vast quantities are 
produced of al l qu alities and sjiite d for all purpose^ / 

In New England from 20,000 to 30,000 acres are cultivated 
annually, estimated to yield on an average from 1500 to lYOO 
pounds to the acre. The annual product in cases is from 
60,000 to 170,000. t Of the Middle States, New York and 
Pennsylvania furnish a large amount of "seed leaf" as it is 
called. In 18Y2 the latter state reported 38,010 cases, mostly 
grown in three counties. A fine quality of tobacco is raised 
in the immediate vicinity of the old William Penn mansion, 
and is known to all dealers as superior leaf. In New York 



* Tobacco l8 not allowed to pags from one state Into another without paying a certala 

iity. 

tThe amount in 1872, was 172,000. 



CULTIVATION IN THE SOUTH. 481 

the crop is usually good, and along the valleys are found 
some excellent lands for its culture. 

As we go South, we reach the great tobacco-growing states, 
Maryland, Virginia, Kentucky, and others. Maryland has 
long been noted for its tobacco, and annually exports thou- 
sands of hogsheads to European markets. Virginia, as we 
have seen, is the oldest tobacco-producing state in the Union, 
and still continues to raise thousands of acres of the "weed" 
for home use and for export. In 1622, six years after its 
cultivation began, she produced 60,000 pounds of leaf tobacco. 
North Carolina also raises a fine article of smoking tobacco — 
of fine color and superior flavor. This state has long been 
noted for its superior leaf tobacco, and ever since the first 
settlement of the state has produced large quantities of it. 
In 1753 100 hogsheads were exported, the number constantly 
increasing until the present. In Georgia some tobacco is 
grown. Havana tobacco was first cultivated in this state by 
Col. Mcintosh, and succeeded finely in some of the counties 
along the coast. 

In Florida, Havana tobacco is cultivated altogether. It 
diflfers somewhat in flavor, however, so that it is called Florida 
tobacco, not because it is grown in that state, but because it 
is a little bitter, unlike that grown in Cuba. Kentucky is the 
great tobacco-producing state of the Union. Two-fifths of 
the entire amount grown in the country comes from this 
state. In 1871 nearly 150,000 acres were devoted to it in 
the state — producing 103,500,000 pounds of leaf tobacco. 
In Ohio and Missouri large quantities of tobacco are grown, 
the former state furnishing both cutting and seed leaf 
tobaccos. The other Western states including Illinois, Indi- 
ana, and Wisconsin, are engaged largely in its production, 
and furnish a good article of leaf. 

California for the last few years has given the culture of 
tobacco some attention, and promises to become a great 
tobacco-producing state. The United States have cultivated 
in some seasons 350,769 acres of tobacco, valued at $25,901,- 
769. The average yield per acre is greater in Connecticut 
31 



482 QUANTITY GROWN IN VARIOUS COUNTRIES. 

than in any other state, being 1,700 pounds, while the small- 
est yield is in Georgia, 350 pounds. The average price per 
pound in Connecticut is 25cts ; in Kentucky 7 7-lOcts ; in Geor- 
gia 21 4-lOcts; in Ohio 9 1-lOcts; and in Pennsylvania 15 2-10 
cts. In 1855 there was exported from this country 150,213 
hogsheads and 13,366 cases of tobacco. 

In Europe large quantities of tobacco are grown, excepting 
in England, Spain, and Portugal, where its culture is prohibit- 
ed by law to benefit the colonial growers of the plant. Austria 
is the great tobacco-producing country of Europe, and yields 
an annual product of 45,000,000 pounds of tobacco ; the leaf 
is of good quality, and is used for cigars. Prance also raises 
about 30,000,000 pounds of tobacco besides importing large 
quantities from the United States. In Russia the annual 
tobacco crop is about 25,000,000 pounds. In Holland about 
as much tobacco is grown as in the state of Connecticut — 
6,000,000 pounds and the product is adapted for both cigar 
and snuff -leaf. Large quantities of tobacco ar^ also imported, 
from 30,000,000 to 35,000,000 pounds. The tobacco factories in 
the country are stated to give employment to one million oper- 
atives. Belgium produces considerable tobacco, about 3,000,- 
000 pounds annually. Switzerland also raises from 1,000,000 
to 1,200,000 pounds of leaf. In Greece tobacco is an impor- 
tant product and the quality of leaf is very fine ; her product 
has been as high as 5,500,000 pounds. 

/' In Asia tobacco has long been cultivated, and is one of the 
greatest products of the country. In both Asiatic and 
European Turkey the annual production is about 43,000,000 
pounds. In China and Japan large quantities are grown, as 
well as in Persia, Thibet, and other portions of Asia. In the 
Philippine Islands its cultivation is carried on by the Span- 
iards, as it has been for upwards of 250 years. Bowring says 
of its culture : — 

" The money value of the tobacco grown in the Philippines 
is estimated at from 4,000,000 to 5,000,000 of dollars, say 
1,000,0001. sterling. Of this nearly one half is consumed in 
the island, one quarter is exported in the form of cheroots 
(which is the Oriental word for cigars), and the remainder 



GOVERNMENT MONOPOLY. 483 

Bent to Spain in leaves and cigars, being estimated as an 
annual average contribution exceeding 800,000 dollars. The 
eale of tobacco is a strict government monopoly, but tlie 
impossibility of keeping up any sufficient machinery for the 
protection of that monopoly is obvious even to the least 
observant. The cultivator, who is bound to deliver all his 
produce to the government, first takes care of himself and his 
neighbors, and secures the best of his growth for his own 
benefit. From functionaries able to obtain the best which 
the government brings to market, a present is often volun- 
teered, which shows that they avail themselves of something 
better than the best. And in discussing the matter with the 
most intelligent of the empleados, they agreed that the 
emancipation of the producer, the manufacturer and the 
seller, and the establishment of a simple duty, would be more 
productive to the revenue than the present vexatious and 
inefficient system of privileges. 

" In 1810 the deliveries were 50,000 bales (of two arrobas), of 
which Gapan furnished 47,000 and Cayayan 2,000. In 1841 
Cayayan furnished 170,000 bales ; Gapan, 84,000 ; and New 
Eiscay, 34,000. But the produce is enormously increased ; 
and so large is the native consumption, of which a large pro. 
portion pays no duty, that it would not be easy to make even 
an approximative estimate of the extent and value of the whole 
tobacco harvest. Where the fiscal authorities are so scattered 
and so corrupt ; — where communications are so imperfect and 
sometimes wholly interrupted ; where large tracts of territory 
are in the possession of tribes unsubdued or in a state of imper- 
fect subjection ; where even among the more civilized Indians 
the rights of property are rudely defied, and civil authority 
imperfectly maintained ; where smuggling, though it may be 
attended with some risk, is scarcely deemed by any body an 
oflense, and the very highest functionaries themselves smoke 
and ofier to their guests contraband cigars on account of their 
superior quality, — it may well be supposed that lax laws, lax 
morals and lax practices, harmonize with each other, and that 
such a state of things as exists in the Philippines must be the 
necessary, the inevitable result. 

" I am informed by the alcalde mayor of Cayayan that he 
sent in 1858 to Manilla from that province tobacco for no less 
a value than 2,000,000 dollars. The quality is the best of the 
Philippines ; it is all forwarded in leaf to the capital. The to- 
bacco used by the natives is not subject to the estanco, and on 
my inquiring as to the cost of a cigar in Cagayan, the answer was 



484 A SOURCE OF REVENUE. 

* Casinada ' (Almost nothing). They are not so well rolled 
as those of the government, but undoubtedly the raw material 
is of the very best." 

In Sumatra some of the finest tobacco in the world is pro- 
duced which has an established reputation in European markets. 

In Africa tobacco is grown to some extent in Egypt, Algiers 
and Tripoli as well as by the natives of Central and South, 
Western Africa. The French have paid particular attention 
to its culture in Algiers and have succeeded in producing 
tobacco of good flavor and texture. In Australia the plant 
does remarkably well and promises to become as celebrated as 
that of other portions or islands of the East India Archipelago. 

It readily appears from the extensive cultivation of tobacco 
that it can hardly fail of becoming an important article of 
commerce. The Spaniards and Portuguese found it to be an 
important source of revenue, and from South America and the 
West Indies exported large quantities to Europe. As soon as 
it began to be cultivated in Virginia its commercial value 
began to be apparent and attracted many navigators who 
came thither to barter for tobacco and furs, and other articles 
of inferior value. Most of the tobacco exported from the 
United States is shipped to Europe and from there is reshipped 
to Asia and Africa. Of foreign tobacco but little finds its 
way to this country, the duties* preventing many varieties of 
excellent quality competing with our domestic tobacco. Cuba, 
St Domingo and Manilla tobacco are the only varieties that 
are imported from other countries. West India tobacco, more 
particularly that of Cuba — is shipped to all parts of the world, 
especially to Spain, Great Britain, Russia, France and the 
United States. 

The tobacco of South America is exported almost entirely 
to Europe. England receives a large quantity of South 
American tobacco as well as Spain and Portugal. The 
varieties cultivated in Asia and Africa for export are shipped 
mostly to Europe. Great Britain, Spain, France and Ger- 
many are the great tobacco-consuming countries of the 

■* Thirty-five cent* a pound, gold. 



MANUFACTURE. 485 

world, or at least of Europe. In Great Britain, Spain and 
Portugal, no tobacco is cultivated, and these countries are 
therefore dependent upon their colonies for a supply of the 
great product. The commerce in the plant is extensive and 
reaches to every part of the globe. /No_ nation, state, or 
empire now ignores the revenue to be derived from its 
import or culture, and many a government receives more 
from this plant alone than from any other source. 

While some nations prohibit its culture at home, their 
colonies are allowed to grow it, and thus the article and the 
revenue are both secured. But while the production of the 
plant and the commerce depending on it are extensive, they 
are not more so than the manufacture of the leaf into the 
various preparations for use. The government work-shops of 
Seville and Manilla, as well as those of Havana and Paris are 
of enormous proportions and employ thousands of operatives 
in the manufacture of cigars and cigarettes. In this country 
and in England, large quantities of cigars are made both 
from domestic and foreign tobaccos. 

In South America also many are made, but more for home 
use than for export. Cutting leaf is largely manufactured 
in this country, especially near the great leaf growing sec- 
tions. Most of this is used here, the leaf for manufacture 
abroad being exported in hogsheads for cutting in any form 
desired. Snuff leaf is exported largely from this country to 
Great Bri/tain and France, where are the largest manufact- 
urers of snuff in the world. At the present time the 
demand seems greater for cutting than for cigar leaf. The 
growths of the West Indies and South America furnish a 
large quantity of fine tobacco for cigars, but comparatively 
little for cutting purposes. European tobaccos are adapted 
for both cutting and for cigars, and are used extensively at 
home though not considered equal to American varieties, 
being of a milder flavor. 'As an article of production and 
commerce, tobacco must be considered as important as any 
of the great products or staples, since the demand is constant 
and continually increasing. Year by year its cultivation 



486 INCREASE OF TOBACCO CULTURE. 

extends into new sections, where it becomes a permanent 
production if the soil and climate prove congenial. \ From 
time to time new varieties become known, and are ciiltivated 
in various countries with success varying according to the 
soil and climate and the knowledge of the planter. E'owhere 
is the plant receiving more attention both in its cultivation 
and manufacture, than in this country. The varieties grown 
in the tropics have been tested with more or less success, and 
bid fair ere long to become the leading kinds in some sec- 
tions. But not alone in this country is the plant attracting 
the attention of the great commercial nations. In Europe 
and Asia as well as in Africa, its production is assuming the 
large proportions due to its vast importance to Agriculture 
and Commerce. 




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